Investigation on the viscoelasticity of synchronous hepatocellular carcinoma cells

Having made use of the micropipette aspiration technique, we here investigated the viscoelastic properties of hepatocellular carcinoma (HTC) cells from the view of cell cycle. The synchronous G₁ and S phase cells were achieved through thymine-2-desoryriboside and colchicine sequential blockage method and double thymine-2-desoryriboside blockage method, respectively. The synchronization results detected with flow cytometer showed that it could meet the requirements of the experiments nicely. Experimental results were analyzed with a standard linear solid viscoelastic model, in which an elastic element, K₁, is in parallel with a Maxwell element composed of another elastic element, K₂, in series with a viscous element, μ. The results indicated that high K₁, K₂ values and low μ value was the general characteristics of the cells; G₁ phase cells had higher K₁ values and low μ value than S phase cells, which endowed G₁ phase cells with higher elasticity and faster passive deformability than S phase cells. The results maybe also reflected the difference of cytoskeleton between G₁ and S phase cells, and suggested that G₁ phase cells were more suitable for surviving and metastasis in blood circulation than S phase cells.