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      Brillouin microscopy: an emerging tool for mechanobiology

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          Abstract

          The role and importance of mechanical properties of cells and tissues in cellular function, development and disease has widely been acknowledged, however standard techniques currently used to assess them exhibit intrinsic limitations. Recently, Brillouin microscopy, a type of optical elastography, has emerged as a non-destructive, label- and contact-free method that can probe the viscoelastic properties of biological samples with diffraction-limited resolution in 3D. This led to increased attention amongst the biological and medical research communities, but it also sparked debates about the interpretation and relevance of the measured physical quantities. Here, we review this emerging technology by describing the underlying biophysical principles and discussing the interpretation of Brillouin spectra arising from heterogeneous biological matter. We further elaborate on the technique's limitations, as well as its potential for gaining insights in biology, in order to guide interested researchers from various fields.

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          Matrix stiffness drives Epithelial-Mesenchymal Transition and tumour metastasis through a TWIST1-G3BP2 mechanotransduction pathway

          Matrix stiffness potently regulates cellular behavior in various biological contexts. In breast tumours, the presence of dense clusters of collagen fibrils indicates increased matrix stiffness and correlates with poor survival. It is unclear how mechanical inputs are transduced into transcriptional outputs to drive tumour progression. Here we report that TWIST1 is an essential mechano-mediator that promotes epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) in response to increasing matrix stiffness. High matrix stiffness promotes nuclear translocation of TWIST1 by releasing TWIST1 from its cytoplasmic binding partner G3BP2. Loss of G3BP2 leads to constitutive TWIST1 nuclear localization and synergizes with increasing matrix stiffness to induce EMT and promote tumour invasion and metastasis. In human breast tumours, collagen fiber alignment, a marker of increasing matrix stiffness, and reduced expression of G3BP2 together predict poor survival. Our findings reveal a TWIST1-G3BP2 mechanotransduction pathway that responds to biomechanical signals from the tumour microenvironment to drive EMT, invasion, and metastasis.
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            Elastography: A Quantitative Method for Imaging the Elasticity of Biological Tissues

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              Micropipette aspiration of living cells

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                Author and article information

                Journal
                Nature Methods
                Nat Methods
                Springer Science and Business Media LLC
                1548-7091
                1548-7105
                September 23 2019
                Article
                10.1038/s41592-019-0543-3
                31548707
                df5588fc-3029-4501-b7cb-646e3977cabf
                © 2019

                http://www.springer.com/tdm

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