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1. An Effort to Fabricate Clinically Relevant Scaffold Using 3D Bioprinting Processes

   Nelson, Cartwright; Tuladhar, Slesha; Habib, Ahasan (May 2022, Proceedings for IISE Annual Conference & Expo 2022)

   Ellis, K; Ferrell, W; Knapp, J. (Ed.)

   Three-dimensional bio-printing is a rapidly growing field attempting to recreate functional tissues for medical and pharmaceutical purposes. Development of functional tissues and organs requires the ability to achieve large full-scale scaffolds that mimic human organs. It is difficult to achieve large scaffolds that can support themselves without damaging printed cells in the process. The high viscosity needed to support large prints requires high amounts of pressure that diminishes cell viability and proliferation. By working with the rheological, mechanical, and microstructural properties of different compositions, a set of biomaterial compositions was identified to have high structural integrity and shape fidelity without needing a harmful amount of pressure to extrude. Various large scale-scaffolds were fabricated (up to 3.0 cm, 74 layers) using those hybrid hydrogels ensuring geometric fidelity. This effort can ensure to fabricate large scaffolds using 3D bio-printing processes ensuring proper internal and external geometries. 

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2. Generation, Transmission, and Regulation of Mechanical Forces in Embryonic Morphogenesis

   https://doi.org/10.1002/smll.202103466  

   Sutlive, Joseph; Xiu, Haning; Chen, Yunfeng; Gou, Kun; Xiong, Fengzhu; Guo, Ming; Chen, Zi (November 2021, Small)

   Abstract Embryonic morphogenesis is a biological process which depicts shape forming of tissues and organs during development. Unveiling the roles of mechanical forces generated, transmitted, and regulated in cells and tissues through these processes is key to understanding the biophysical mechanisms governing morphogenesis. To this end, it is imperative to measure, simulate, and predict the regulation and control of these mechanical forces during morphogenesis. This article aims to provide a comprehensive review of the recent advances on mechanical properties of cells and tissues, generation of mechanical forces in cells and tissues, the transmission processes of these generated forces during cells and tissues, the tools and methods used to measure and predict these mechanical forces in vivo, in vitro, or in silico, and to better understand the corresponding regulation and control of generated forces. Understanding the biomechanics and mechanobiology of morphogenesis will not only shed light on the fundamental physical mechanisms underlying these concerted biological processes during normal development, but also uncover new information that will benefit biomedical research in preventing and treating congenital defects or tissue engineering and regeneration. 

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3. Linear viscoelastic properties of the vertex model for epithelial tissues

   https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1010135  

   Tong, Sijie; Singh, Navreeta K.; Sknepnek, Rastko; Košmrlj, Andrej (May 2022, PLOS Computational Biology)

   Bollenbach, Tobias (Ed.)

   Epithelial tissues act as barriers and, therefore, must repair themselves, respond to environmental changes and grow without compromising their integrity. Consequently, they exhibit complex viscoelastic rheological behavior where constituent cells actively tune their mechanical properties to change the overall response of the tissue, e.g., from solid-like to fluid-like. Mesoscopic mechanical properties of epithelia are commonly modeled with the vertex model. While previous studies have predominantly focused on the rheological properties of the vertex model at long time scales, we systematically studied the full dynamic range by applying small oscillatory shear and bulk deformations in both solid-like and fluid-like phases for regular hexagonal and disordered cell configurations. We found that the shear and bulk responses in the fluid and solid phases can be described by standard spring-dashpot viscoelastic models. Furthermore, the solid-fluid transition can be tuned by applying pre-deformation to the system. Our study provides insights into the mechanisms by which epithelia can regulate their rich rheological behavior. 

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4. Plant cell mechanobiology: Greater than the sum of its parts

   https://doi.org/10.1093/plcell/koab230  

   Codjoe, Jennette M; Miller, Kari; Haswell, Elizabeth S (September 2021, The Plant Cell)

   Abstract The ability to sense and respond to physical forces is critical for the proper function of cells, tissues, and organisms across the evolutionary tree. Plants sense gravity, osmotic conditions, pathogen invasion, wind, and the presence of barriers in the soil, and dynamically integrate internal and external stimuli during every stage of growth and development. While the field of plant mechanobiology is growing, much is still poorly understood—including the interplay between mechanical and biochemical information at the single-cell level. In this review, we provide an overview of the mechanical properties of three main components of the plant cell and the mechanoperceptive pathways that link them, with an emphasis on areas of complexity and interaction. We discuss the concept of mechanical homeostasis, or “mechanostasis,” and examine the ways in which cellular structures and pathways serve to maintain it. We argue that viewing mechanics and mechanotransduction as emergent properties of the plant cell can be a useful conceptual framework for synthesizing current knowledge and driving future research. 

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5. Matrix Stiffness Modulates Mechanical Interactions and Promotes Contact between Motile Cells

   https://doi.org/10.3390/biomedicines9040428  

   Bose, Subhaya; Dasbiswas, Kinjal; Gopinath, Arvind (April 2021, Biomedicines)

   null (Ed.)

   The mechanical micro-environment of cells and tissues influences key aspects of cell structure and function, including cell motility. For proper tissue development, cells need to migrate, interact, and form contacts. Cells are known to exert contractile forces on underlying soft substrates and sense deformations in them. Here, we propose and analyze a minimal biophysical model for cell migration and long-range cell–cell interactions through mutual mechanical deformations of the substrate. We compute key metrics of cell motile behavior, such as the number of cell-cell contacts over a given time, the dispersion of cell trajectories, and the probability of permanent cell contact, and analyze how these depend on a cell motility parameter and substrate stiffness. Our results elucidate how cells may sense each other mechanically and generate coordinated movements and provide an extensible framework to further address both mechanical and short-range biophysical interactions. 

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