Abstract
Cancer cells have unique nanomechanical properties, i.e., they behave as if they were elastic. This property of cancer cells is believed to be one of the main reasons for their facilitated ability to spread and metastasize. Thus, the so-called nanomechanical phenotype of cancer cells is viewed as an important indicator of the cells’ metastatic behavior. One of the most highly metastatic cancer cells are melanoma cells, which have a very unusual property: they can synthesize the pigment melanin in large amounts, becoming heavily pigmented. So far, the role of melanin in melanoma remains unclear, particularly the impact of the pigment on metastatic behavior of melanoma cells. Importantly, until recently the potential mechanical role of melanin in melanoma metastasis was completely ignored. In this work, we examined melanoma cells isolated from hamster tumors containing endogenous melanin pigment. Applying an array of advanced microscopy and spectroscopy techniques, we determined that melanin is the dominating factor responsible for the mechanical properties of melanoma cells. Our results indicate that the nanomechanical phenotype of melanoma cells may be a reliable marker of the cells’ metastatic behavior and point to the important mechanical role of melanin in the process of metastasis of melanoma.
Highlights
Primary tumors represent a set of heterogeneous cell subsets with distinct properties [1]
In the present work based on the analysis of melanoma cells ex vivo, we showed that the magnitude of the mechanical effect of endogenous pigment on the overall elasticity of the cells dominated any influence of actin cytoskeleton organization and level of cell spread
Results obtained in this work demonstrate that neither organization of actin cytoskeleton nor the level of cell spread has a significant impact on the overall mechanical properties of melanoma cells containing endogenous pigment
Summary
Primary tumors represent a set of heterogeneous cell subsets with distinct properties [1]. Elasticity of cancer cells has shown considerable promise in this regard This is justified by high specificity of elasticity measurements and unique character of such a cellular marker. Many studies have demonstrated that cancer cells with lower values of the Young’s modulus—the measure of elasticity— exhibited higher invasive potential [4,5,6]. Based on such observations the so called “nanomechanical phenotype” of cancer cells is viewed as an important indicator of the cells’ metastatic behavior and has even been proposed as a potential diagnostic marker of cancer [7]
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