Magneto-mechanical stimulation of living cells: towards innovative therapies based on mechanobiological effects

Abstract

Cellular mechano-sensitivity can be exploited to modify cellular functions, opening the doors to the design of innovative therapies. This can be very efficiently achieved through the use of magnetic microparticles dispersed among the cells and actuated in a remotely controlled manner by external variable magnetic fields. Experiments were conducted on glioma cancer cell lines under several conditions: in-vitro 2D in Petri dishes, in-vitro 2D on soft substrates, in-vitro 3D on organoïds/tumoroïds and in-vivo on mice. The possibility to destroy cancer cells in-vitro by magneto-mechanical stimulation was clearly demonstrated. The comparison between the different experimental conditions revealed the key role of the microenvironment on cells physiological reactions to the magneto-mechanical stimulation. It appears that the organoïds/tumoroïds provide a very relevant in-vitro model for the study of these mechanobiological effects before translation to in-vivo studies.