fig1

Figure 1. PDAC progression model and interaction with extracellular matrix (ECM). (1) Pancreatic cancer cells proliferate in the primary tumour, metabolising nutrients delivered by the blood vasculature and surrounding stroma; (2) cancer cells invade through the ECM, including cancer-associated fibroblasts (CAFs) and tumour-associated macrophages (TAMs), among other cancer-associated cell types, eventually intravasating or invading into the lymph and travelling to distant sites; (3) circulating tumour cells (CTCs) must develop resistance to anoikis, as well as shear stress, in order to survive in the circulation with red blood cells (RBCs) and leucocytes; (4) after travelling through the circulation, CTCs extravasate at secondary sites, commonly the liver, establishing a new niche. Re-use permitted under Creative Commons CC BY Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the license is given, and indication of whether changes were made. Link to license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). You are not required to obtain permission to reuse this article^[18]