Takeo Matsumoto^1,*, Chizuru Hirooka¹, Yong Fan¹, Junfeng Wang¹, Naoki Mori¹, Eijiro Maeda¹

Molecular & Cellular Biomechanics, Vol.16, Suppl.2, pp. 81-81, 2019, DOI:10.32604/mcb.2019.07102

Abstract Aortic wall thickens in response to hypertension. Many studies reported that the wall thickening occurs to maintain the wall stress in the circumferential direction at a constant level. In case of the longitudinal direction, however, there are few studies suggesting the constancy of the stress. Such anisotropic response may be attributable to the circumferential alignment of the smooth muscle cells (SMCs) in the wall [1]. However, to the authors’ knowledge, there are no study discussing the underlying mechanism of the anisotropic response. It has been reported that mechanical deformation of the nuclei causes transcription upregulation [2]. This might suggest that… More >

Hana Chang^*, Melissa L. Knothe Tate^∗,†,‡

Molecular & Cellular Biomechanics, Vol.8, No.4, pp. 297-318, 2011, DOI:10.3970/mcb.2011.008.297

Abstract In the preceding study (Part A), we showed that prescribed seeding conditions as well as seeding density can be used to subject multipotent stem cells (MSCs) to volume changing stresses and that changes in volume of the cell are associated with changes in shape, but not volume, of the cell nucleus. In the current study, we aim to control the mechanical milieu of live cells using these prescribed seeding conditions concomitant to delivery of shape changing stresses via fluid flow, while observing adaptation of the cytoskeleton, a major cellular transducer that modulates cell shape, stiffness and remodeling. We hypothesize that… More >