Fig 6. Effects of the differential composition of extracellular matrix on cell adhesion and signaling of Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma.

OSCC with high E-cadherin levels (blue cells) shows collective and single cell migration in the presence of laminin and collective non-directional migration in fibronectin. This switch correlated to an increase in Rac1 and a decrease on RhoA activation and modulation of the vinculin levels in adhesion, induced by the fibronectin-enriched environment. For OSCCs with low E-cadherin levels (orange cells), fibronectin induced smaller adhesions and increased Rac1 signaling, which correspond to a fast single cell migration phenotype. This model proposes that the ECM composition can trigger the tumor invasive behavior according to differentiation levels of OSCC cells.