Continuum descriptions of spatial spreading for heterogeneous cell populations: Theory and experiment

Abstract

Variability in cell populations is frequently observed in both in vitro and in vivo settings. Intrinsic differences within populations of cells, such as differences in cell sizes or differences in rates of cell motility, can be present even within a population of cells from the same cell line. We refer to this variability as cell heterogeneity. Mathematical models of cell migration, for example, in the context of tumour growth and metastatic invasion, often account for both undirected (random) migration and directed migration that is mediated by cell-to-cell contacts and cell-to-cell adhesion.A key feature of standard models is that they often assume that the population is composed of identical cells with constant properties. This leads to relatively simple single-species homogeneous models that neglect the role of heterogeneity. In this work, we use a continuum modelling approach to explore the role of heterogeneity in spatial spreading of cell populations. We employ a three-species heterogeneous model of cell motility that explicitly incorporates different types of experimentally-

Growth of mixed cancer cell population – in silico the size matters

“…Besides that, the model can be further explored with different sets of GoL rules, additional parameters, and new variables. Also, the other functions of cancer growth (than those given by Gompertz) may be tested and the additional determinants associated with the intercellular contact as well as the cell motility could be introduced into the model (see Matsiaka et al, 2019;Malik et al, 2020). Further development of the model could allow for more variety in choosing the cell size, as well as for introducing additional cell lines to a heterogeneous tumor.…”