Bridging cell-scale simulations and radiologic images to explain short-time intratumoral oxygen fluctuations

by Jessica L. Kingsley, James R. Costello, Natarajan Raghunand, Katarzyna A. Rejniak Radiologic images provide a way to monitor tumor development and its response to therapies in a longitudinal and minimally invasive fashion. However, they operate on a macroscopic scale (average value per voxel) and are not able to capture microscopic scale (cell-level) phenomena. Nevertheless, to examine the causes of frequent fast fluctuations in tissue oxygenation, models simulating individual cells’ behavior are needed. Here, we provide a link between the average data values recorded for radiologic images and the cellular and vascular architecture of the corresponding tissues. Using hy brid agent-based modeling, we generate a set of tissue morphologies capable of reproducing oxygenation levels observed in radiologic images. We then use these in silico tissues to investigate whether oxygen fluctuations can be explained by changes in vascular oxygen supply or by modulations in cellu lar oxygen absorption. Our studies show that intravascular changes in oxygen supply reproduce the observed fluctuations in tissue oxygenation in all considered regions of interest. However, larger-magnitude fluctuations cannot be recreated by modifications in cellular absorption of oxygen in a biolo gically feasible manner. Additionally, we develop a procedure to identify plausible tissue morphologies for a given temporal series of average data from radiology images. In future applications, this approach can ...
Source: PLoS Computational Biology - Category: Biology Authors: Source Type: research