ArticleScientific reports2016
Correlating confocal microscopy and atomic force indentation reveals metastatic cancer cells stiffen during invasion into collagen I matrices.
Article in Scientific reports, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 69 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The trial behind it
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Who cites it
69 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- 3DACS biomaterials science & engineering · 2023Pooled it
- Microengineered Gradient Hydrogels for Mechanobiology.Advanced healthcare materials · 2026Review
- TheMaterials today. Bio · 2026Review
- Mechanical Signaling: Molecular Mechanisms, Biological Functions, Diseases, and Therapeutic Targets.MedComm · 2025Review
- Interfacial Stress Regulates Plasticity and Drug Resistance at the Breast Cancer-Host Interface.Advanced science (Weinheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany) · 2025Article
- Review
- Cellular EMT-status governs contact guidance in an electrospun TACS-mimickingMaterials today. Bio · 2025Article
- Multimodal mechano-microscopy reveals mechanical phenotypes of breast cancer spheroids in three dimensions.APL bioengineering · 2024Article
- How cytoskeletal crosstalk makes cells move: Bridging cell-free and cell studies.Biophysics reviews · 2024Review
- Holotomography and atomic force microscopy: a powerful combination to enhance cancer, microbiology and nanotoxicology research.Discover nano · 2024Review
- Phenotypic Heterogeneity, Bidirectionality, Universal Cues, Plasticity, Mechanics, and the Tumor Microenvironment Drive Cancer Metastasis.Biomolecules · 2024Review
- Brillouin microscopy.Nature reviews. Methods primers · 2024Article
- Article
- Advanced Mechanical Testing Technologies at the Cellular Level: The Mechanisms and Application in Tissue Engineering.Polymers · 2023Review
- Insights in Cell Biomechanics through Atomic Force Microscopy.Materials (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
- Targeting cell-matrix interface mechanobiology by integrating AFM with fluorescence microscopy.Progress in biophysics and molecular biology · 2022Review
- Mechanoregulation of Metastasis beyond the Matrix.Cancer research · 2022Article
- Review
- 3D imaging for driving cancer discovery.The EMBO journal · 2022Review
- Article
9 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Mechanical interactions between cells and their microenvironment dictate cell phenotype and behavior, calling for cell mechanics measurements in three-dimensional (3D) extracellular matrices (ECM). Here we describe a novel technique for quantitative mechanical characterization of soft, heterogeneous samples in 3D. The technique is based on the integration of atomic force microscopy (AFM) based deep indentation, confocal fluorescence microscopy, finite element (FE) simulations and analytical modeling. With this method, the force response of a cell embedded in 3D ECM can be decoupled from that of its surroundings, enabling quantitative determination of the elastic properties of both the cell and the matrix. We applied the technique to the quantification of the elastic properties of metastatic breast adenocarcinoma cells invading into collagen hydrogels. We found that actively invading and fully embedded cells are significantly stiffer than cells remaining on top of the collagen, a clear example of phenotypical change in response to the 3D environment. Treatment with Rho-associated protein kinase (ROCK) inhibitor significantly reduces this stiffening, indicating that actomyosin contractility plays a major role in the initial steps of metastatic invasion.
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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.