Metastatic cells exploit their stoichiometric niche in the network of cancer ecosystems.

ABSTRACT: Metastasis is a nonrandom process with varying degrees of organotropism-specific source-acceptor seeding. Understanding how patterns between source and acceptor tumors emerge remains a challenge in oncology. We hypothesize that organotropism results from the macronutrient niche of cells in source and acceptor organs. To test this, we constructed and analyzed a metastatic network based on 9303 records across 28 tissue types. We found that the topology of the network is nested and modular with scale-free degree distributions, reflecting organotropism along a specificity/generality continuum. The variation in topology is significantly explained by the matching of metastatic cells to their stoichiometric niche. Specifically, successful metastases are associated with higher phosphorus content i

SUBMITTER: Castillo SP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10848726 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature