Experimental study of the difference in deformation between normal and pathological, renal and bladder, cells induced by acoustic radiation force.

Previous studies have shown that alterations in the mechanical properties of cells may be associated with the onset and progression of some forms of pathology. In this paper, an experimental study of two types of cells, renal (cancer) and bladder (cancer) cells, is described which used acoustic radiation force (ARF) generated by a high-frequency ultrasound focusing transducer and performed on the operating platform of an inverted light microscope. Comparing images of cancer cells with those of normal cells of the same kind, we find that the cancer cells are more prone to deform than normal cells of the same kind under the same ARF. In addition, cancer cells with higher malignancy are more deformable than those with lower malignancy. This means that the deformability of cells may be used to distinguish diseased cells from normal ones, and more aggressive cells from less aggressive ones, which may provide a more rapid and accurate method for clinical diagnosis of urological disease in the future.