IIT-G scientists throw light on metastatic cancer cell movement

GUWAHATI: A group of scientists from the Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati (IIT), has demonstrated the movement of metastatic cancer cells - a development that can be very useful for biologists to understand the mystery of metastatic cell migration, spreading cancer in human body.
The breakthrough research work has been endorsed in the prestigious Scientific Reports published from London this week.

The interdisciplinary research, led by IIT-G director Gautam Biswas with his colleagues Siddhartha Sankar Ghosh of biosciences & bioengineering and Amaresh Dalal from mechanical engineering departments, for the first time performed experiments in a constricted microchannel, which is similar to human circulating system, to show movement of cancer cells at viable state. Binita Nath and Asif Raza, both PhD students, assisted them in the study.

The pioneering research in the field of cancer cell study conducted by IIT-G scientists has demonstrated how metastatic cancer cells, which can aggravate cancer in the human body, could deform, survive and pass through microcapillaries. "Multicellular aggregates of cancer cells are the initiators of distant organ metastasis and cause spread of cancer in the body. However, it was assumed in the past that these cells or cell clusters are too large to pass through narrow vessels, such as pulmonary capillaries, to reach other organs.''