Scientists at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Rockefeller University have found that a molecule, called ACF7, helps regulate and power the cell’s movement along the extracellular matrix from the inside — findings that could have implications for understanding how cancer cells metastasize.

They found that ACF7 is an orchestrator of directed cellular movement by guiding microtubules along a roadway of actin cables, leading them toward focal adhesions at the cell’s periphery. When the researchers mutated ACF7 so it couldn’t release stored energy in cells, the cells were sluggish in their movement. So by suppressing ACF7’s function in cancer cells, it might be possible to slow metastasis.