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Cellular Biomechanics and Viscoelasticity

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Abstract

This chapter explores the intricate world of cell biomechanics and provides a comprehensive overview of the structural and mechanical aspects of cells. Beginning with a description of cellular architecture, the chapter examines the role of the cell cytoskeleton in maintaining cell shape and facilitating cell adhesion and movement. This includes the dynamic interactions between cells and their extracellular matrix, as well as cell–cell interactions. A section on tissue engineering introduces the principles and applications of creating artificial tissues, which are crucial for advancing medical treatments. The latter part of the chapter introduces viscoelasticity, covering the fundamentals of linearly elastic materials and models based on springs and dashpots that describe cellular biomechanical behavior. It explains creep and recovery, as well as linear and nonlinear viscoelastic models, including the Maxwell, Kelvin-Voigt, Standard Solid, Standard Fluid, and Four-Element models. This chapter serves as a critical resource for students and researchers, offering insights into the mechanical principles governing cellular behavior and their applications in biomedical engineering.

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The authors are grateful for financial support from the National Institutes of Health (grants GM23244 and GM53905), and to very helpful comments on the manuscript from Elliot Elson, Vlodya Gelfand, Paul Matsudaira, Julie Theriot, and Sally Zigmond. D. A. L. and A. F. H. would also like to thank Alan Wells, and Anna Huttenlocher and Rebecca Sandborg, respectively, for stimulating conversations on this subject, and Sean Palecek for Figure 2Figure 2. Finally, we extend our apologies to all our colleagues in the field whose work we were unable to cite formally because of imposed reference limitations.
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