Multi-Omics Analysis of 3D SKOV3 Ovarian Cancer Model Cell line Cultured on Novel Silicon-Titanium Diboride Micropatterned Substrate

Ovarian cancer (OC) remains one of the deadliest cancers affecting women globally, with an estimated number of three hundred thousand new cases and about two hundred thousand deaths annually. The 5-year survival rate of ovarian cancer is approximately 30% or less when diagnosed during the advanced stage. The detection of OC in advanced stages is partly due to non-specific clinical symptoms at earlier stages of the diseases and inadequate effective screening approaches. Advanced cell culture platforms have emerged as key interdisciplinary field in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. In cancer research, modeling the in vivo tumor remains a challenge. The conventional 2D culture platforms are still widely used for cell-based assays. However, they are limited in accurately representing physiological condition. More so, important features like cell-cell and cell- matrix interactions are not properly represented. Gene expression, metabolism, and cell proliferation are altered in 2D culture systems. Unlike the conventional 2D culture systems, 3D culture systems better recapitulate the in vivo architecture and tumor microenvironment. This study adopts the micropatterned Silicon Titanium Diboride (SiTiB2) for improved ovarian cancer modeling to identify the molecular signatures that drives dynamic transformation during ovarian cancer metastasis. The ovarian cancer model cell line SKOV3 was cultured on a novel SiTiB2 a physiologically relevant 3D substrates, to generate a cell monolayer, at day three, aggregates at day seven, and disaggregation at day nine. The transcriptomic profiles of the SKOV3 cell lines were analyzed across the different time points to capture the dynamic, functional, and molecular signature changes in 3D microenvironment on the culture platform. The transcriptomics analysis identifies significant alterations in genes associated with immune signaling, protease regulation was unique to day 7 versus control, cytokine signaling, controlled proteolysis, complement iii activation processes were overlapping between day 7 and day 9 versus control. On day 9, there was molecular cues shift towards extracellular matrix remodeling, adhesion, angiogenesis, and PI3K-Akt-driven survival signaling, suggesting a more invasive and adaptive phenotype. Overall, the SiTiB2 platform effectively captures the 3D dynamic matrix remodeling processes, correlate structural alterations with molecular signatures as well as signaling pathways.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Biotechnology

Grantor

University of Houston

Year dc:date.issued

2026

Author dc:creator

• Amediku, Raphael 1994-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Chitrala, Kumaraswamy Naidu

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Merchant, Fatima A
• Khan, Abdul L

• Silicon Titanium Diboride
• Differentially Expressed Genes
• SKOV3

Language dc:language.iso

English

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/10657/21516

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:uh-ir.tdl.org:10657/21516