ArticleBiophysical journal2015
Migration in Confined 3D Environments Is Determined by a Combination of Adhesiveness, Nuclear Volume, Contractility, and Cell Stiffness.
Article in Biophysical journal, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 99 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
99 citing papers in PubMed.
- Nuclear mechanobiology: a brief history and five unresolved questions.Nucleus (Austin, Tex.) · 2026Article
- Nuclear mechanobiology in confined cell migration.Nucleus (Austin, Tex.) · 2026Review
- Simple fabrication method for cancer cell migration studies on biomimetic substrates with tunable stiffness.Materials today. Bio · 2026Article
- A geometric-surface PDE model for cell-nucleus translocation through confinement.PLoS computational biology · 2026Article
- Mechano-stress endorsing heterogeneous lung cancer cells migration into confined channels and investigating tumor spheroids growth of confined space migrating cells.Scientific reports · 2026Article
- Measurement of cellular traction forces during confined migration.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Rapid restoration of cell phenotype and matrix forming capacity following transient nuclear softening.Acta biomaterialia · 2025Article
- Deep learning reveals how cells pull, buckle, and navigate fibrous environments.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Mechanical signatures in cancer metastasis.npj biological physics and mechanics · 2025Review
- Review
- Article
- Mechanobiology of 3D cell confinement and extracellular crowding.Biophysical reviews · 2024Review
- Investigation of Cell Mechanics and Migration on DDR2-Expressing Neuroblastoma Cell Line.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Microfluidic Applications in Prostate Cancer Research.Micromachines · 2024Review
- Confinement controls the directional cell responses to fluid forces.Cell reports · 2024Article
- Nuclear rupture induced by capillary constriction forces promotes differential effects on metastatic and normal breast cells.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Insights into the mechanobiology of cancer metastasis via microfluidic technologies.APL bioengineering · 2024Review
- An entropy-based approach for assessing the directional persistence of cell migration.Biophysical journal · 2024Article
- Morphological entropy encodes cellular migration strategies on multiple length scales.NPJ systems biology and applications · 2024Article
- Methods and Protocol for Single-Cell Motility Assays under Topological Constraints.Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.) · 2024Article
39 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
12 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
In cancer metastasis and other physiological processes, cells migrate through the three-dimensional (3D) extracellular matrix of connective tissue and must overcome the steric hindrance posed by pores that are smaller than the cells. It is currently assumed that low cell stiffness promotes cell migration through confined spaces, but other factors such as adhesion and traction forces may be equally important. To study 3D migration under confinement in a stiff (1.77 MPa) environment, we use soft lithography to fabricate polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) devices consisting of linear channel segments with 20 μm length, 3.7 μm height, and a decreasing width from 11.2 to 1.7 μm. To study 3D migration in a soft (550 Pa) environment, we use self-assembled collagen networks with an average pore size of 3 μm. We then measure the ability of four different cancer cell lines to migrate through these 3D matrices, and correlate the results with cell physical properties including contractility, adhesiveness, cell stiffness, and nuclear volume. Furthermore, we alter cell adhesion by coating the channel walls with different amounts of adhesion proteins, and we increase cell stiffness by overexpression of the nuclear envelope protein lamin A. Although all cell lines are able to migrate through the smallest 1.7 μm channels, we find significant differences in the migration velocity. Cell migration is impeded in cell lines with larger nuclei, lower adhesiveness, and to a lesser degree also in cells with lower contractility and higher stiffness. Our data show that the ability to overcome the steric hindrance of the matrix cannot be attributed to a single cell property but instead arises from a combination of adhesiveness, nuclear volume, contractility, and cell stiffness.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.