Cell contraction induces long-ranged stress stiffening in the extracellular matrix

YL Han, P Ronceray, G Xu, A Malandrino… - Proceedings of the …, 2018‏ - pnas.org
Animal cells in tissues are supported by biopolymer matrices, which typically exhibit highly
nonlinear mechanical properties. While the linear elasticity of the matrix can significantly …

Fiber networks amplify active stress

P Ronceray, CP Broedersz, M Lenz - … of the national academy of sciences, 2016‏ - pnas.org
Large-scale force generation is essential for biological functions such as cell motility,
embryonic development, and muscle contraction. In these processes, forces generated at …

High strain-rate soft material characterization via inertial cavitation

JB Estrada, C Barajas, DL Henann, E Johnsen… - Journal of the …, 2018‏ - Elsevier
Mechanical characterization of soft materials at high strain-rates is challenging due to their
high compliance, slow wave speeds, and non-linear viscoelasticity. Yet, knowledge of their …

Microbuckling of fibrin provides a mechanism for cell mechanosensing

J Notbohm, A Lesman, P Rosakis… - Journal of The …, 2015‏ - royalsocietypublishing.org
Biological cells sense and respond to mechanical forces, but how such a mechanosensing
process takes place in a nonlinear inhomogeneous fibrous matrix remains unknown. We …

Nonlinear elasticity of the ECM fibers facilitates efficient intercellular communication

RS Sopher, H Tokash, S Natan, M Sharabi, O Shelah… - Biophysical journal, 2018‏ - cell.com
Biological cells embedded in fibrous matrices have been observed to form intercellular
bands of dense and aligned fibers through which they mechanically interact over long …

[HTML][HTML] A new computational framework for materials with different mechanical responses in tension and compression and its applications

Z Du, Y Zhang, W Zhang, X Guo - International Journal of Solids and …, 2016‏ - Elsevier
Materials possessing tension-compression asymmetric behavior can be simulated by a bi-
modulus constitutive relation, which assumes the materials have different moduli in tension …

Continuum elastic models for force transmission in biopolymer gels

H Wang, X Xu - Soft Matter, 2020‏ - pubs.rsc.org
We review continuum elastic models for the transmission of both external forces and internal
active cellular forces in biopolymer gels, and relate them to recent experiments. Rather than …

Elastic anisotropy governs the range of cell-induced displacements

S Goren, Y Koren, X Xu, A Lesman - Biophysical journal, 2020‏ - cell.com
The unique nonlinear mechanics of the fibrous extracellular matrix (ECM) facilitates long-
range cell-cell mechanical communications that would be impossible for linear elastic …

Unexpected softening of a fibrous matrix by contracting inclusions

M Sarkar, BM Burkel, SM Ponik, J Notbohm - Acta Biomaterialia, 2024‏ - Elsevier
Cells respond to the stiffness of their surrounding environment, but quantifying the stiffness
of a fibrous matrix at the scale of a cell is complicated, due to the effects of nonlinearity and …

Tension-compression asymmetry at finite strains: A theoretical model and exact solutions

Z Du, G Zhang, T Guo, S Tang, X Guo - … of the Mechanics and Physics of …, 2020‏ - Elsevier
Besides being ubiquitous in engineering applications such as Polyethylene terephthalate,
materials with tension-compression asymmetry can also be found in lots of biological …