Researchers identify how cells move faster through mucus than blood: Specialized cell movement may explain progression of cancer and cystic fibrosis

Researchers at the University of Toronto, Johns Hopkins University and Vanderbilt University have discovered that certain cells move surprisingly faster in thicker fluid — think honey as opposed to water, or mucus as opposed to blood — because their ruffled edges sense the viscosity of their environment and adapt to increase their speed.

Their combined results in cancer and fibroblast cells — the type that often creates scars in tissues — suggest that the viscosity of a cell’s surrounding environment is an important contributor to disease, and may help explain tumour progression, scarring in mucus-filled lungs affected by cystic fibrosis, and the wound-healing process.

The study, “Membrane ruffling is a mechanosensor of extracellular fluid viscosity,” published today in Nature Physics, sheds new light on cell environments, an under-explored area of research.

“This link between cell viscosity and attachment has never been demonstrated before,” says Sergey Plotnikov, assistant professor in the Department of Cell and Systems Biology in the Faculty of Arts & Science at the University of Toronto and a co-corresponding author of the study. “We found that the thicker the surrounding environment, the stronger the cells adhere to the substrate and the faster they move — much like walking on an icy surface with shoes that have spikes, versus shoes with no grip at all.”

Understanding why cells behave in this surprising way is important because cancer tumours create a viscous environment, which means spreading cells can move into tumours faster than non-cancerous tissues. Since the researchers observed that cancer cells speed up in a thickened environment, they concluded that the development of ruffled edges in cancer cells may contribute to cancer spreading to other areas of the body.

Targeting the spreading response in fibroblasts, on the other hand, may reduce tissue damage in the mucus-filled lungs affected by cystic fibrosis. Because ruffled fibroblasts move quickly, they are the first type of cells to move through the mucus to the wound, contributing to scarring rather than healing. These results also may imply that by changing the viscosity of the lung’s mucus, one can control the cell movement.

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