Despite the spectacular achievements of molecular biology in the second half of the twentieth century and the crucial advances it permitted in cancer research, the fight against cancer has brought some disillusions. It is nowadays more and more apparent that getting a global picture of the very diverse and interlinked aspects of cancer development necessitates, in synergy with these achievements, other perspectives and investigating tools. In this undertaking, multidisciplinary approaches that include quantitative sciences in general and physics in particular play a crucial role. This 'focus on' collection contains 19 articles representative of the diversity and state-of-the-art of the contributions that physics can bring to the field of cancer research.
Focus on the Physics of Cancer
![Figure](https://cms.iopscience.org/0ad93827-19b8-11e1-a8be-e901e4daa3c3/Physics-of-Cancer_editorial-figure.gif?guest=true)
Figure. Spinodal decompostion in a two-phase mixture model giving labyrinth clusters of cancerous (green) and healthy (blue) cells. Cell–cell adhesion and nutrient consumption originate this microstructural patterning, which is compared to clinical observations in skin tumor lesions. Taken from Chatelain et al 2011 New J. Phys. 13 115013
Robijn Bruinsma, University of California, Los Angeles, USA
Jean-François Joanny, Curie Institute, Paris, France
Josef A Käs, University of Leipzig, Germany
The growth and proliferation of cancer have traditionally been investigated from a molecular–genetic–biological perspective. Increasingly, however, the mechanisms underpinning the development of cancer cells and tumours are being illuminated from a physical point of view. This focus issue aims to bring together some of the cutting-edge work in the field, in order to illustrate the current state of the art. We hope that you find the work featured in this issue to be interesting and of use in your research.
NJP board member, Cecile Sykes, has recently given an interview on 'the physics of cancer'. Listen to it here.
The articles listed below form the complete collection.