Advanced dynamic atomic force microscopy methods for high-resolution in vitro biomechanical assays of cancer cells

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Human cell mechanical properties can change significantly due to invasion of foreign organisms or disease. For example, recent research has clearly shown that the mechanical properties (elasticity, adhesion) of tumor cells change dramatically when they are about to metastasize. Thus elasticity and adhesion measurements of a living cell can be used as indicators of its health or as early indicators of impending disease. Such biomechanical assays can also offer valuable insight into the underlying disease mechanisms and aid in the discovery of anti-cancer treatments that target the cytoskeleton of cancer cells. The proposed work deals with the development of advanced methods using the Atomic Force Microscope for fast, high resolution, minimally invasive, biomechanical assays of cancer cells. As opposed to many existing methods of cell biomechanical assays, the proposed methods will provide quantitative maps or distributions of mechanical properties of cancer cells. By finely resolving variations of local nanomechanical properties of living cancer cells a wealth of new diagnostic information on cancer biomechanics will become available. Such new information could be widely useful for early cancer diagnosis, anti-cancer drugs, and for a better fundamental understanding of cancer cell biophysics/biomechanics.