# Microfluidic platform for solid tumor mechanics and invasion

> **NIH NIH R01** · CORNELL UNIVERSITY · 2024 · $351,339

## Abstract

Project Summary
Cancer metastasis accounts for over 90% of all cancer deaths. Important abilities of metastatic tumor cells
include breaking away from the primary tumor and invading into surrounding tissue before disseminating to
secondary tumor sites. Solid tumor stress caused by rapid growth of tumor cells and abnormality of the vascular
tissue has long been associated with poor prognosis of cancer. Despite the clinical importance, the basic
understanding of tumor mechanics and its relation to tumor invasion is lacking. This is in part due to the lack of
in vitro tools that are able to investigate quantitatively tumor mechanics in a physiologically relevant 3D setting.
Current material mechanical testing tools such as the rheometer have played important roles in our current
understanding of biomaterials and tumor mechanics. However, the conventional rheometer is not easily made
compatible with cell culture conditions and results are spatially averaged, masking important single cell and
molecular level information. Atomic force microscopy and pipette aspiration are cell culture compatible, but low
throughput. The goal of the proposed research is to develop a high throughput microfluidic rheometer for
systematic studies of tumor mechanics and invasion in a physiologically realistic 3D setting and compatible
with dynamic optical imaging at single cell and spheroid levels. We will deliver a set of principles that govern
tumor mechanics and its relation with invasion. We postulate that tumor mechanics is a key predictor for
tumor invasiveness. The proposed project is innovative because it represents the first generation of
microfluidic rheometers that are capable of full mechanical testing for tumor mechanics studies, and at the
same time compatible with tumor invasion experiments. Tools developed here can be easily extended to
use for other living materials, and lessons learned here will eventually lead to knowledge important for
developing novel diagnostic or/and treatment strategies for cancer.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10798332
- **Project number:** 5R01CA221346-07
- **Recipient organization:** CORNELL UNIVERSITY
- **Principal Investigator:** Mingming Wu
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $351,339
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-08-01 → 2027-02-28

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10798332

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10798332, Microfluidic platform for solid tumor mechanics and invasion (5R01CA221346-07). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10798332. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*