RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Collective forces of tumor spheroids in three-dimensional biopolymer networks
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 654079
DO 10.1101/654079
A1 Christoph Mark
A1 Thomas J. Grundy
A1 David Böhringer
A1 Julian Steinwachs
A1 Geraldine M. O’Neill
A1 Ben Fabry
YR 2019
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/05/31/654079.abstract
AB We describe a method for quantifying the contractile forces that tumor spheroids collectively exert on highly nonlinear three-dimensional collagen networks. While three-dimensional traction force microscopy for single cells in a nonlinear matrix is computationally complex due to the variable cell shape, here we exploit the spherical symmetry of tumor spheroids to derive a scale-invariant relationship between spheroid contractility and the surrounding matrix deformations. This relationship allows us to directly translate the magnitude of matrix deformations to the total contractility of arbitrarily sized spheroids. We show that collective forces of tumor spheroids reflect the contractility of individual cells for up to 1h after seeding, while collective forces on longer time-scales are guided by mechanical feedback from the extracellular matrix.