Stress-dependent growth in breast cancer arises from a mechano-osmotic coupling and cell-sizing checkpoint.

Abstract

Mechanoresponsive cell proliferation is a feature of growing tumors, despite the suppression of many other regulatory checkpoints in cancer, but the underlying cell-scale mechanisms driving this behavior have not yet been established. In this study, we propose a biophysical model for cell growth as governed by actively controlled osmolarity, which we integrate with a discrete particle framework to simulate growth and remodeling of breast cancer spheroids. Confinement and biomechanical feedback f