Scaling laws and fractals in cancer
Life is the most complex and diverse physical system in the known universe. It is remarkable that underlying that complexity it is possible to find simple scaling laws in many biological processes over a wide range of spatial and temporal scales. Many processes in biology obey scaling laws: metabolic rates, lengths of genomes, tree heights, concentrations of RNA, masses of cerebral gray matter, density of mitochondria and life spans, etc. We study scaling laws in cancer to find regularities behind the observed phenomena (metabolism, growth rates, etc.) and define metrics of cancer aggressiveness that have utility as prognostic and response biomarkers.
Publications
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Metabolic Activity Grows in Human Cancers Pushed by Phenotypic VariabilityJ.J. Bosque, G.F. Calvo, D. Molina-García, J. Pérez-Beteta, A.M. García Vicente, V. M. Pérez-GarcíaiScience 26(3) 106118 (2023)
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Growth exponents reflect evolutionary processes and treatment response in brain metastasesB. Ocaña-Tienda, J. Pérez-Beteta, D. Molina-García, J. Jiménez-Sánchez, O. Leon-Triana, A. Ortiz de Mendivil, B. Asenjo, D. Albillo, L. Pérez-Romasanta, M. Valiente, L. Zhu, P. García- Gómez, E. González-Del Portillo, M. Llorente, N. Carballo, E. Arana, V. M. Pérez-Garcíanpj Systems Biology and Applications 9, 35 (2023)
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Universal scaling laws rule explosive growth in human cancersV.M. Pérez-García, G.F. Calvo, J.J. Bosque, O. León-Triana, J. Jiménez-Sánchez, J. Pérez-Beteta, J. Belmonte-Beitia, M. Valiente, L. Zhu, P. García-Gómez, P. Sánchez-Gómez, E. Hernández, R. Hortigüela, Y. Azimzade, D. Molina-García, A.Martínez-Rubio, A. Acosta, A. Ortiz de Mendivil, F. Vallette, P. Schucht, M. Murek, M.Pérez-Cano, D.Albillo, AF Honguero, G.A. Jiménez, E. Arana, AM García-VicenteNature Physics 16, 1232-1237 (2020)
Projects
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Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (2013 - 2015)
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Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha (2018 - 2021)
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Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (Spain) (2020 - 2023)
Collaborators
Mathematical modelling is being developed by MOLAB researchers in collaboration with Philip Maini (Mathematical Institute, University of Oxford). Biological and clinical aspects cover a plethora of tumors for which real-patient data is available, thanks to our collaborators in hospitals such as Hospital General Universitario de Ciudad Real, Hospital 12 de Octubre and Hospital de Valencia.
