Substrate stiffness influences phenotype and function of human antigen-presenting dendritic cells

Dendritic cells (DCs) are specialized immune cells that scan peripheral tissues for foreign material or aberrant cells and, upon recognition of such danger signals, travel to lymph nodes to activate T cells and evoke an immune response. For this, DCs travel large distances through the body, encountering a variety of microenvironments with different mechanical properties such as tissue stiffness. While immune-related pathological conditions such as fibrosis or cancer are associated with tissue stiffening, the role of tissue stiffness in regulating key functions of DCs has not been studied yet. Here, we investigated the effect of substrate stiffness on the phenotype and function of DCs by conditioning DCs on polyacrylamide substrates of 2, 12 and 50 kPa. Interestingly, we found that C-type lectin expression on immature DCs (iDCs) is regulated by substrate stiffness, resulting in differential antigen internalization. Furthermore, we show that substrate stiffness affects β(2) integrin expression and podosome formation by iDCs. Finally, we demonstrate that substrate stiffness influences CD83 and CCR7 expression on mature DCs, the latter leading to altered chemokine-directed migration. Together, our results indicate that DC phenotype and function are affected by substrate stiffness, suggesting that tissue stiffness is an important determinant for modulating immune responses.