Quantitative Measurements of Intercellular Adhesion Strengths between Cancer Cells with Different Malignancies Using Atomic Force Microscopy.

Intercellular adhesion strengths between two kinds of murine breast cancer cells with different malignancies were measured quantitatively using a metal cup-attached chip with atomic force microscopy (AFM). The cup-attached chip was used to approach a cell, pick it up, and then approach another cell, and the adhesion strengths were measured according to the contact time of the cells between 0 to 60 s. Separation work was used as a parameter for quantitative comparisons of the strengths. As a result, the work of a highly metastatic cancer cell (FP10SC2) was greater than a low metastatic cancer cell (4T1-LM) throughout all contact times examined. Adhesion was analyzed from a point of a view of binding kinetics of receptors on cells, and two possibilities were found: one was the number of cell adhesive receptors increased, and the other was the work to separate single molecular binding increased with increasing cancer cell malignancy. These results indicated quantitative measurements of intercellular adhesion strengths using AFM yielded information to understand the mechanism of the cancer progression from a new perspective.