Modeling How Heterogeneity in Cell Cycle Length Affects Cancer Cell Growth Dynamics in Response to Treatment.

ABSTRACT: Tumors are complex, dynamic, and adaptive biological systems characterized by high heterogeneity at genetic, epigenetic, phenotypic, as well as tissue microenvironmental level. In this work, utilizing cellular automata methods, we focus on intrinsic heterogeneity with respect to cell cycle duration and explore whether and to what extent this heterogeneity affects cancer cell growth dynamics when cytotoxic treatment is applied. We assume that treatment acts on cancer cells specifically during mitosis and compare it with a (cell cycle-non-specific) cytotoxic treatment that acts randomly regardless of the cell cycle phase. We simulate the spatiotemporal evolution of tumor cells with different initial spatial configurations and different cell length probability distributions. We observed that

SUBMITTER: Tzamali E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7518087 | biostudies-literature | 2020

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature