The Genetics of Cell Motility and Invasion

The majority of cancers derive from epithelial cells. However these cells only become truly dangerous when they detach from the epithelium of origin and migrate through surrounding tissue until they reach the bloodstream. Only then can the cancerous cells be disseminated to distant sites resulting in metastasis. This behavior seems to mimic that of a variety of embryonic cells which undergo so-called epithelial to mesenchymal transitions. Such transitions are critical to the development of virtually every organ and tissue in the body, especially for example the peripheral nervous system which derives from the neural crest. Yet this cellular behavior remains poorly understood at a mechanistic level. It is likely that epithelial to mesenchymal transitions require alterations in patterns of transcription, in cell adhesion, and in the organization of the cytoskeleton. Our goal is to apply a systematic genetic approach in Drosophila to identify the genes that are required to transform a cell from being part of a stationary epithelium to a migratory state.