Figure 1.

In primary pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomas (left circle), neoplastic epithelial cells (green) are embedded in a dense fibroinflammatory (blue) matrix laid down by fibroblasts (orange) and other stromal cell types. When metastasizing tumor cells colonize distant sites such as the liver (middle circle), they initially encounter a harsh and unreceptive environment. However, successful metastatic cells reestablish the desmoplastic stroma to a similar extent as found at the primary site (right circle).