Sensing of Biomechanical Properties of Normal and Cancerous Cells Using Micropillar Simulation

Investigation into the biomechanical properties of cells is very critical in understanding their role in disease diagnostics and designing appropriate therapeutic measures. Young's modulus is one such major biomechanical property that gets critically altered in a cancerous cell compared to a healthy one. This alteration can be easily detected by studying the variation in micropillar deflection due to changes in traction force exerted over its surface. In the present study, Young's modulus values of healthy 3T3 fibroblast cells and MCF-7 breast cancer cells were taken from recently published data to obtain the traction force exerted on a <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$20\ \mu \mathrm{m}$</tex> diameter micropillar. This traction force was subsequently used to calculate micropillar deflection using COMSOL Multiphysics software and through mathematical modelling for cell adhesion at three sites over the pillar- at its base, mid-point and tip. The simulation results demonstrated a greater deflection for normal cells, indicating greater traction force due to higher Young's modulus as compared to softer cancerous cells for adhesion at all three regions. Further, simulation results also correlated well with the mathematical models, demonstrating that simple simulation tools may be highly applicable in discriminating a normal cell from a cancerous one.