A Force Measurement Method Based on Flexible PDMS Grating

Jin, Chengyu; Ma, Cui; Yang, Zhou; Lin, Hui

doi:10.3390/app10072296

Cited by 24 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…For comparison with a less porous elastic material commonly used in mechanobiology, the common Sylgard 184 commercial form of poly-dimethylsiloxane (PDMS) was used (Dow Corning). Two different proportions of prepolymer:curing agent were employed, namely 10:1 and 15:1 w / w respectively to obtain two different expected elastic moduli of ~1.3 MPa and ~0.9 MPa, respectively [ 37 ]. After mixing the two agents, the mixture was poured on glass slides, degassed and cured at 60 °C for 2 h in a convection oven.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Determination by Relaxation Tests of the Mechanical Properties of Soft Polyacrylamide Gels Made for Mechanobiology Studies

et al. 2021

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Following the general aim of recapitulating the native mechanical properties of tissues and organs in vitro, the field of materials science and engineering has benefited from recent progress in developing compliant substrates with physical and chemical properties similar to those of biological materials. In particular, in the field of mechanobiology, soft hydrogels can now reproduce the precise range of stiffnesses of healthy and pathological tissues to study the mechanisms behind cell responses to mechanics. However, it was shown that biological tissues are not only elastic but also relax at different timescales. Cells can, indeed, perceive this dissipation and actually need it because it is a critical signal integrated with other signals to define adhesion, spreading and even more complicated functions. The mechanical characterization of hydrogels used in mechanobiology is, however, commonly limited to the elastic stiffness (Young’s modulus) and this value is known to depend greatly on the measurement conditions that are rarely reported in great detail. Here, we report that a simple relaxation test performed under well-defined conditions can provide all the necessary information for characterizing soft materials mechanically, by fitting the dissipation behavior with a generalized Maxwell model (GMM). The simple method was validated using soft polyacrylamide hydrogels and proved to be very useful to readily unveil precise mechanical properties of gels that cells can sense and offer a set of characteristic values that can be compared with what is typically reported from microindentation tests.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Determination by Relaxation Tests of the Mechanical Properties of Soft Polyacrylamide Gels Made for Mechanobiology Studies

et al. 2021

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“…First, 5 g of PDMS prepolymer (Sylgard 184, Dow Corning, MI, USA) composed with a 15:1 base to catalyst ratio was poured onto the polyethylene naphthalate (PEN) film (TEONEX Q51-25, Teijin Ltd., Tokyo, Japan). The 15:1 base to catalyst ratio was employed to obtain softer PDMS membrane than the manufacturer’s recommended ratio of 10:1 [ 31 ]. Air bubbles were removed by vacuum, and then the film was spin-coated at 1200 rpm for 2 min.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Facile Fabrication of Thin-Bottom Round-Well Plates Using the Deformation of PDMS Molds and Their Application for Single-Cell PCR

Yamahira

Heike

2020

Micromachines

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Recently, microdevices made of resins have been strongly supporting cell analysis in a range of fields, from fundamental life science research to medical applications. Many microdevices are fabricated by molding resin to a mold made precisely from rigid materials. However, because dimensional errors in the mold are also accurately printed to the products, the accuracy of the product is limited to less than the accuracy of the rigid mold. Therefore, we hypothesized that if dimensional errors could be self-corrected by elastic molds, microdevices could be facilely fabricated with precision beyond that of molds. In this paper, we report a novel processing strategy in which an elastic mold made of polymethylsiloxane (PDMS) deforms to compensate for the dimensional error on the products. By heat-press molding a polycarbonate plate using a mold that has 384 PDMS convexes with a large dimensional error of height of ± 15.6 µm in standard deviation, a 384-round-well plate with a bottom thickness 13.3 ± 2.3 µm (n = 384) was easily fabricated. Finally, single-cell observation and polymerase chain reactions (PCRs) demonstrated the application of the products made by elastic PDMS molds. Therefore, this processing method is a promising strategy for facile, low-cost, and higher precision microfabrication.

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“…Two different stiffnesses were prepared by tuning the concentration of the prepolymer and its curing agent during preparation. Two different proportions were employed, namely 10:1 and 15:1 w/w respectively to obtain two different expected elastic moduli of ~1.3 MPa and ~0.9 MPa respectively [36]. After mixing the two agents the mixture was poured on glass slides, degassed and cured at 60°C for 2 hours in a convection oven.…”

Section: Pdms Preparationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Determination by Relaxation Tests of the Mechanical Properties of Soft Polyacrylamide Gels Made for Mechanobiology Studies

Pérez-Calixto

Amat-Shapiro

Zamarrón-Hernández

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Following the general aim of recapitulating the native mechanical properties of tissues and organs in vitro, the field of materials science and engineering has benefited from recent progress in developing compliant substrates with similar physical and chemical properties. In particular, in the field of mechanobiology, soft hydrogels can now reproduce the precise range of stiffnesses of healthy and pathological tissues to study the mechanisms behind cell response to mechanics. However, it was shown that biological tissues are not only elastic but also relax at different timescales. Cells can indeed perceive and actually need this dissipation because it is a critical signal integrated with other signals to define adhesion, spreading and even more complicated functions. The mechanical definition of hydrogels used in mechanobiology is however commonly limited to the elastic stiffness (Young’s modulus) and this value is known to depend greatly on the measurement conditions that are rarely reported. Here, we report that a simple relaxation test performed under well defined conditions can provide all the necessary information to characterize soft materials mechanically, by fitting the dissipation behavior with a generalized Maxwell model (GMM). The method was validated using soft polyacrylamide hydrogels and proved to be very useful to unveil precise mechanical properties of gels that cells can sense and offer a set of characteristic values that can be compared with what is typically reported from microindentation tests.

show abstract

A Force Measurement Method Based on Flexible PDMS Grating

Cited by 24 publications

References 19 publications

Determination by Relaxation Tests of the Mechanical Properties of Soft Polyacrylamide Gels Made for Mechanobiology Studies

Determination by Relaxation Tests of the Mechanical Properties of Soft Polyacrylamide Gels Made for Mechanobiology Studies

Facile Fabrication of Thin-Bottom Round-Well Plates Using the Deformation of PDMS Molds and Their Application for Single-Cell PCR

Determination by Relaxation Tests of the Mechanical Properties of Soft Polyacrylamide Gels Made for Mechanobiology Studies

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