A Mathematical Model To Study Breast Cancer Growth

The aim of this paper is (i) to study breast cancer growth by mean of a mathematical model describing cell population dynamics during cancer growth, and (ii) to use this model to reproduce and explain experimental data.We started from a linear model describing cancer subpopulations evolution based on the Cancer Stem Cell (CSC) theory, and we added feedback mechanisms from the cell populations to mimic micro-environment effects in cancer growth. In details, we hypothesized two feedback mechanisms and we studied their effects both separately and combined together. In this way we obtained three new models that we tuned using data derived by TUBO Cancer cell line and describing the evolution of the total cell population and the subpopulations over time. Finally, we exploited these three models to understand which combination of feedback mechanisms better describe the experimental data.