Cytoskeletal Remodeling in Fibrous Environments to Study Pathophysiology

Mechanical interactions of cells with their immediately surrounding extracellular matrix (ECM) is now known to be critical in pathophysiology. For example, during cancer progression, while uncontrollable cell division leads to tumor formation, the subsequent metastatic migration of cells from the primary tumor site to distant parts of the body causes most cancer-related deaths. The metastatic journey requires cells to be able to adopt different shapes and move persistently through the highly fibrous native ECM, thereby requiring significant spatiotemporal reorganization of the cell cytoskeleton. While numerous studies performed on flat 2-dimensional culture platforms and physiological 3D gels have elucidated cytoskeletal reorganization, our understanding on how cells adapt to natural fibrous microenvironments and regulate their behavior in response to specific ECM biophysical cues including fiber size, spacing, alignment and stiffness remains in infancy. Here, we utilize the non -electrospinning Spinneret tunable engineered parameters (STEP) technique to manufacture ECM mimicking suspended fibrous matrices with precisely controlled fiber diameters, network architecture, inter-fiber spacing and structural stiffness to advance our fundamental understanding of how external cues affect cytoskeleton-based cellular forces in 3-distinct morphological processes of the cell cycle starting from division to spreading and migration. Mechanobiological insights from these studies are implemented to deliver intracellular cargo inside cells using electrical fields.

Holistically, we conclude that fibrous environments elicit multiple new cell behaviors never before reported. Specifically, our new findings include (i) design of fiber networks regulates actin networks and cell forces to sculpt nuclei in varying shapes: compressed ovals, tear drop, and invaginations, and drive the nuclear translocation of transcription factors like YAP/TAZ. In all these shapes, nuclei remain rupture-free, thus demonstrating the unique adaptability of cells to fibers, (ii) dense crosshatch networks are fertile environments for persistent 1D migration in 3D shapes of rounded nuclei and low density of actin networks, while sparse fiber networks induce 2D random migration in flattened shapes and well-defined actin stress fibers, (iii) actin retraction fiber-based stability regulates mitotic errors. Cells undergoing mitosis on single fibers exhibit significant 3D movement, and those attached to two fibers can have rotated mitotic machinery, both conditions contributing to erroneous division, and (iv) a bi-phasic force response to electroporation that coincides with actin cytoskeleton remodeling. Cells on suspended fibers can withstand higher electric field abuse, which opens opportunities to deliver cargo of varying sizes inside the cell.

Taken altogether, our findings provide new mechanobiological understanding of cell-fiber interactions at high spatiotemporal resolution impacting cell migration, division and nuclear mechanics-key behaviors in the study of pathophysiology.