Valeria Panzetta

Title: Mechanobiology of tumor microenvironment

Abstract:

Cells are able to sense microenvironmental stimuli, such as chemical, topographic and mechanical gradients encased within the extracellular matrix (ECM), which controls their time and space presentation to tightly regulate cell and tissue functions 
[1]. Recently it has been appreciated that extracellular borne forces are transmitted to the nucleus, via the cytoskeletal filaments and
biochemical signaling, to alter the chromatin organization, inter-chromosome contacts and gene
expression programs 
[2]. This is the foundation of mechanobiology which aims at linking the regulatory role of biophysical signals on cell functions (i.e., migration, differentiation, and neoplastic transformation) with tensional status of the cytoskeleton along with the mechanical interplay between cytoskeletal forces and nuclear envelope deformation. Specifically, the relationship between microenvironment and cell mechanics could reveal pathophysiological disfunctions at different hierarchical tissue levels. If the physical properties of the ECM are decisive in determining the cell behavior, the local microenvironment of cancer cells actively participate in tumorigenesis and tumor progression. In fact, in cancer the ECM undergoes drastic changes in terms of both stiffness and organizational architecture 
[3] and the stiffened tumor mechanical microenvironment seems to beinvolved in very important pathways associated with the cell malignant transformation 
[4]. In order to disclose the collaborative and synergistic interaction between cells and ECM in lung adenocarcinoma, our scientific team is evaluating what happens in terms of mechanical cell transformation, when lung cells with different oncogenic and tumorigenic potentials, interact with highly controlled mechanical microenvironments

Biography:

Valeria Panzetta is Assistant professor at the Department of Chemical, Materials and IndustrialProduction Engineering of the University of Naples Federico II. She has over 10 years of experienceat academic and research institutions in developing experimental tools to study cell mechanics and to understand cellular mechanotransduction processes, by which cells detect and recognize different mechanical cues, in physiological and pathological conditions. Her scientific team has established a novel and proprietary tissue engineering technology to build up homotypic and heterotypic physiopathological 3D human tissues in vitro exhibiting functional, structural, and histological features closely resembling their native counterparts. She is now engaged in defining novel strategies for the
fabrication of in vitro biological tissues through the administration of dynamic biophysical signals.