Advanced Design and Manufacture of Mechanoactive Materials Inspired by Skin, Bones, and Skin-on-Bones

Abstract

Life is mechanobiological. Natural living materials exhibit remarkable, emergent and smart properties under mechanical loading. Such materials are classified as mechanoactive , in contrast to electroactive polymers and materials that exhibit advanced properties when subjected to electrical stimulation. Cutting edge, multiscale imaging technologies have proven enabling for the elucidation of molecular to meso-scale structure and function of natural mechanoactive materials. Using Microscopy-Aided Design And ManufacturE, (MADAME) this perspective article describes mechanoactive properties of natural materials including skin-on-bones ( periosteum ) and bone itself. In so doing, it demonstrates the principle to emulate natural smart properties using recursive logic, the basis of many computer algorithms, and to design and manufacture mechanoactive materials and products using advanced manufacturing methods that also incorporate principles of recursive logic. In sum, the MADAME approach translates physically the computer science paradigm of recursion by implementing Jacquard textile methods, which themselves form a historical basis for computing machines, together with additive manufacturing methods including multidimensional printing, stereolithography, laser sintering, etc. These integrated methods provide a foundation and translational pathway for scaled-up manufacture of disruptive mechanoactive materials that will find use in fields as varied as medicine, safety, transport and sports, for internal (implants) and external (wearables) applications.

Advanced Interfacial Design for Electronic Skins with Customizable Functionalities and Wearability

“…cannot only realize the fabrication of new materials such as biological materials, but also fabricate multi‐scale hierarchical structures. [ 158 ] Meanwhile, large‐area, large‐scale and cost‐effective fabrication methods are the necessity for the commercialization of E‐skins.…”

Connectomics of Bone to Brain—Probing Physical Renderings of Cellular Experience

“…In this way, cells encode an organism’s and their own experiences in the physical world, by creating and adapting tissues, throughout life. Just as punch cards encode the recursive logic of textile weaves created with weaving looms (where card holes allow passage of hooks and the fibers they shuttle), genes encode and translate the arrangement of amino acids comprising elastin, collagen and other structural proteins making up tissue weaves ( Knothe Tate, 2017 , 2020 ; Ng et al, 2017a , b ). A major barrier to understanding the emergent behavior that underpins this tissue genesis and adaptation is the lack of methods to image and analyze cellular connectivity across length and time scales.…”

“…We know as biologists that cells manufacture, remodel and adapt tissues throughout life ( Knothe Tate et al, 2016a ; Putra et al, 2019 ). The tissues render physically the collective cellular experience, reflected in architectures (bones) and memories (brain) which themselves exhibit emergent properties ( Knothe Tate, 2020 ). These emergent properties cannot simply be deduced from the individual parts, which themselves do not exhibit such properties; rather, these emergent properties arise from spatial and temporal arrangements among multiple parts, e.g., memories that are physically encoded in neurons are not observable in single neurons but rather emerge from the spatial arrangement and temporal behavior of interacting neurons in the brain.…”

“…This is expected to lead to discovery of novel mechanisms underpinning motor neural circuitry and biomechanical action. Just as dogs and other mammals train their neural networks in their sleep, running and jumping across virtual dream terrains, perhaps the physical experience of life itself is encoded in our cells, the structural proteins our cells manufacture via gene expression and secrete to form our tissues, as well as the adaptation of our tissues throughout life ( Knothe Tate, 2020 ).…”