Associations between plasma membrane blebbing and metastatic progression have been widely reported. There are also reports of increased extracellular vesicle release from cancer cells. Yet the ties between these closely related phenomena are incompletely understood. In this commentary, we remark on a recent finding on cellular membrane blebs in melanoma signaling. We discuss possible implications for cancer biology and draw parallels to knowns and unknowns in the relationships of extracellular vesicles and cancer progression.
Keywords: Membrane blebbing; anoikis; cancer; ectosomes; exosomes; extracellular matrix; extracellular vesicles; large oncosomes; melanoma; metastasis; septin; tumor microenvironment.