Cellular Plasticity in Matrix‑attached and ‑Detached Cells: Implications in Metastasis

Abstract

The ability of cells to assume different phenotypes without
changing their genotype is referred to as cellular plasticity. It is increasingly
being recognized as a fundamental and essential property of cancer
cells, which enables their adaptation to the changing environmental
conditions, imposed by both disease progression and therapeutic intervention.
Epithelial–mesenchymal transition (EMT) is a classical well-studied
example of cellular plasticity during cancer progression that aids
cancer spread by metastasis. A closely associated phenomenon that
entails metastatic progression is the detachment of cancer cells from the
extracellular matrix (ECM) at the primary tumor site, their passage and
survival in the circulation in an anchorage-independent form, and subsequent
re-attachment at a distant site to establish new tumor growth. In
this review, we discuss molecular and metabolic plasticity in matrixattached
and -detached states of cancer cells that aid in metastatic cancer
progression. Further, cellular plasticity enables cancer cells within a
population to assume different phenotypic states, thus leading to cancer
heterogeneity—an emerging evil that needs to be tackled for overcoming
therapy failure and achieving better treatment outcomes.