Directional cues in the tumor microenvironment due to cell contraction against aligned collagen fibers

It is well established that collagen alignment in the breast tumor microenvironment provides biophysical cues to drive disease progression. Numerous mechanistic studies have demonstrated that tumor cell behavior is driven by the architecture and stiffness of the collagen matrix. However, the mechanical properties within a 3D collagen microenvironment, particularly at the scale of the cell, remain poorly defined. To investigate cell-scale...