Breast Cancer Metastasis Research Group

Biomechanical cues and their impact on metastatic fitness

Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer among women worldwide, and metastasis remains the leading cause of breast cancer-related death. Tumour cells can spread from the primary site to organs such as bone, lung, liver and brain, tissues that differ substantially in physical properties, including extracellular matrix (ECM) stiffness. Growing evidence shows that the mechanical properties of the tumour microenvironment influence proliferation, migration, invasion and metastatic progression. My research asks how breast cancer cells sense, adapt to, and retain a memory of these mechanical cues, and how this reshapes their signalling, transcriptional and metabolic programs and, ultimately, their metastatic fitness. By combining in vitro models of mechanical conditioning with molecular, imaging and functional approaches, I aim to uncover how biomechanical information is stored and used by cancer cells, and to identify molecular signatures and therapeutic vulnerabilities tied to the mechanical environments of different metastatic sites.