Simulating cancer growth with multiscale agent-based modeling

Abstract

There have been many techniques developed in recent years to in silico model a variety of cancer behaviors. Agent-based modeling is a specific discrete-based hybrid modeling approach that allows simulating the role of diversity in cell populations as well as within each individual cell; it has therefore become a powerful modeling method widely used by computational cancer researchers. Many aspects of tumor morphology including phenotype-changing mutations, the adaptation to microenvironment, the process of angiogenesis, the influence of extracellular matrix, reactions to chemotherapy or surgical intervention, the effects of oxygen and nutrient availability, and metastasis and invasion of healthy tissues have been incorporated and investigated in agent-based models. In this review, we introduce some of the most recent agent-based models that have provided insight into the understanding of cancer growth and invasion, spanning multiple biological scales in time and space, and we further describe several experimentally testable hypotheses generated by those models. We also discuss some of the current challenges of multiscale agent-based cancer models.

Modeling of Multi-groups Solid Tumor Growth Based on Tumor Biochemical Environment

“…A key problem is how to quantify these parameters, such as proliferation rate and consumption rate, to make them have practical physical meanings and units. Furthermore, the angiogenesis [12] and tumor heterogeneity [13] are also have an important role in the process of tumor growth. These factors will be considered and modeled in our future work.…”

Addressing current challenges in cancer immunotherapy with mathematical and computational modelling

“…Furthermore, since immunotherapy drugs can act on multiple cell targets, for example, CTLA-4 is expressed not only on CD8 þ T cells but also Tregs, development of multi-scale models that incorporate both the interactions of different immune and tumour cell types and their respective intracellular dynamics would have the power to elucidate the multi-scale mechanisms of therapy action. Indeed, multi-scale modelling has already been identified as an important method for generating systems-level predictions of cancer progression and therapy effectiveness [70,71].…”

Systems morphodynamics: understanding the development of tissue hardware

“…A particular recognition should be made here that the articles included cover only very few of the approaches to modelling mechanical morphogenesis, and the omission of specific articles emphasizing other approaches, such as Cellular Potts, Finite-element or Agent-based is simply a result of the exigencies of editing a theme issue and should by no means be taken as a preference or prejudice of the editors. The reader is directed to excellent reviews on these topics elsewhere in the literature [19][20][21][22]. Returning to the more experimental aspects of systems morphodynamics the final three articles describe morphogenetic motifs.…”