The DOI matches its Crossref record; 82 of the 82 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Tissue Cells Feel and Respond to the Stiffness of Their Substrate
Abstract
Normal tissue cells are generally not viable when suspended in a fluid and are therefore said to be anchorage dependent. Such cells must adhere to a solid, but a solid can be as rigid as glass or softer than a baby's skin. The behavior of some cells on soft materials is characteristic of important phenotypes; for example, cell growth on soft agar gels is used to identify cancer cells. However, an understanding of how tissue cells—including fibroblasts, myocytes, neurons, and other cell types—sense matrix stiffness is just emerging with quantitative studies of cells adhering to gels (or to other cells) with which elasticity can be tuned to approximate that of tissues. Key roles in molecular pathways are played by adhesion complexes and the actinmyosin cytoskeleton, whose contractile forces are transmitted through transcellular structures. The feedback of local matrix stiffness on cell state likely has important implications for development, differentiation, disease, and regeneration.
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“The microenvironment of cells is not only affected by microtopography but also by the stiffness of the substrate that cells adhere to, which affects bioactivities ranging from migration to differentiation (28).”
From Modeling physiological events in 2D vs. 3D cell culture (2017) · cites this paper as [28]
Citations
Cites
New Perspectives in Cell Adhesion: RGD and Integrins
Ruoslahti, E. I., & Pierschbacher, M. D. (1987) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.2821619 · Cited by 4,875
Cell Movement Is Guided by the Rigidity of the Substrate
Lo, C.-M., Wang, H.-B., Dembo, M., & Wang, Y.-L. (2000) · Biophysical Journal · doi:10.1016/s0006-3495(00)76279-5 · Cited by 3,289
Self-citationCell locomotion and focal adhesions are regulated by substrate flexibility
Pelham, R. J., & Wang, Y. (1997) · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · doi:10.1073/pnas.94.25.13661 · Cited by 3,082
Self-citationTaking Cell-Matrix Adhesions to the Third Dimension
Cukierman, E., Pankov, R., Stevens, D. R., & Yamada, K. M. (2001) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1064829 · Cited by 3,027
Exploring and Engineering the Cell Surface Interface
Stevens, M. M., & George, J. H. (2005) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1106587 · Cited by 2,607
Effects of substrate stiffness on cell morphology, cytoskeletal structure, and adhesion
Yeung, T., Georges, P. C., Flanagan, L. A., Marg, B., Ortiz, M., Funaki, M., Zahir, N., Ming, W., Weaver, V., & Janmey, P. A. (2005) · Cell Motility and the Cytoskeleton · doi:10.1002/cm.20041 · Cited by 2,325
Self-citationBalaban, N. Q., Schwarz, U. S., Riveline, D., Goichberg, P., Tzur, G., Sabanay, I., Mahalu, D., Safran, S. A., Bershadsky, A. D., Addadi, L., et al. (2001) · Nature Cell Biology · doi:10.1038/35074532 · Cited by 2,137
Cells lying on a bed of microneedles: An approach to isolate mechanical force
Tan, J. L., Tien, J., Pirone, D. M., Gray, D. S., Bhadriraju, K., & Chen, C. S. (2003) · Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · doi:10.1073/pnas.0235407100 · Cited by 2,002
Myotubes differentiate optimally on substrates with tissue-like stiffness
Engler, A. J., Griffin, M. A., Sen, S., Bönnemann, C. G., Sweeney, H. L., & Discher, D. E. (2004) · The Journal of Cell Biology · doi:10.1083/jcb.200405004 · Cited by 1,743
Self-citationNonlinear elasticity in biological gels
Storm, C., Pastore, J. J., MacKintosh, F. C., Lubensky, T. C., & Janmey, P. A. (2005) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature03521 · Cited by 1,707
Self-citation
Research works printed but not linked: 5
- D. R. Welch et al., Cancer Res.60, 1552 (2000).
- F. J. Alenghat, D. E. Ingber, Sci. STKE119, pe6 (2002).
- A. Saez A. Buguin P. Silberzan B. Ladoux Biophys J. in press.
- J. P. Trinkaus, J. P. Lentz, Dev. Biol.89, 115 (1964).
- W. T. Arthur, N. K. Noren, K. Burridge, Biol. Res.35, 239 (2002).
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Matrix elasticity directs stem cell lineage specification
Engler, A. J., Sen, S., Sweeney, H. L., & Discher, D. E. (2006) · Cell · doi:10.1016/j.cell.2006.06.044 · Cited by 13,915
Self-citation3D bioprinting of tissues and organs
Murphy, S. V., & Atala, A. (2014) · Nature Biotechnology · doi:10.1038/nbt.2958 · Cited by 7,034
Matrix Crosslinking Forces Tumor Progression by Enhancing Integrin Signaling
Levental, K. R., Yu, H., Kass, L., Lakins, J. N., Egeblad, M., Erler, J. T., Fong, S. F. T., Csiszar, K., Giaccia, A., Weninger, W., et al. (2009) · Cell · doi:10.1016/j.cell.2009.10.027 · Cited by 4,101
Cell mechanics and the cytoskeleton
Fletcher, D. A., & Mullins, R. D. (2010) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature08908 · Cited by 3,195
Growth Factors, Matrices, and Forces Combine and Control Stem Cells
Discher, D. E., Mooney, D. J., & Zandstra, P. W. (2009) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1171643 · Cited by 2,666
Self-citation
Metadata
- Authors
- Discher, D. E., Janmey, P., & Wang, Y.-L.
- Affiliations
- University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School (US)
- Corresponding author
- Discher, Dennis E.
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 2005-11-18
- Volume
- 310
- Issue
- 5751
- Pages
- 1139-1143
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W2054635074
- Cited by
- 6,382
- References
- 82
- Citations by year
- 2026: 287 · 2025: 269 · 2024: 239 · 2023: 237 · 2022: 318 · 2021: 269 · 2020: 369 · 2019: 389 · 2018: 399 · 2017: 432 · 2016: 379 · 2015: 392 · 2014: 407 · 2013: 369 · 2012: 380
- FWCI
- 9.07
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Cell Biology › Cellular Mechanics and Interactions
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics › Force Microscopy Techniques and Applications
- Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Biomaterials › Hydrogels: synthesis, properties, applications
- Keywords
- substrate stiffness, mechanotransduction, cell-matrix adhesion, cell-substrate adhesion, soft agar, cancer cell detection, fibroblasts, muscle cells, neurons, actomyosin cytoskeleton, adhesion complexes, cell contractility, tissue stiffness, cell differentiation, tissue regeneration
- MeSH terms
- Biomechanical Phenomena, Cell Adhesion, Cell Communication, Cell Physiological Phenomena, Cytoskeleton, Elasticity, Humans, Muscle Contraction, Organogenesis
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
