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Growth and remodeling of load-bearing biological soft tissues

  • Advances in Biomechanics: from foundations to applications
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Abstract

The past two decades reveal a growing role of continuum biomechanics in understanding homeostasis, adaptation, and disease progression in soft tissues. In this paper, we briefly review the two primary theoretical approaches for describing mechano-regulated soft tissue growth and remodeling on the continuum level as well as hybrid approaches that attempt to combine the advantages of these two approaches while avoiding their disadvantages. We also discuss emerging concepts, including that of mechanobiological stability. Moreover, to motivate and put into context the different theoretical approaches, we briefly review findings from mechanobiology that show the importance of mass turnover and the prestressing of both extant and new extracellular matrix in most cases of growth and remodeling. For illustrative purposes, these concepts and findings are discussed, in large part, within the context of two load-bearing, collagen dominated soft tissues—tendons/ligaments and blood vessels. We conclude by emphasizing further examples, needs, and opportunities in this exciting field of modeling soft tissues.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported, in part, by the Emmy Noether program of the German Research Foundation DFG (CY 75/2-1), the International Graduate School for Science and Engineering (IGSSE) of the Technische Universität München, and the United States NIH (R01 HL086418, U01 HL116323, and R01 HL128602).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Computational Mechanics, Technische Universität München, Garching, Germany

    C. J. Cyron

  2. Department of Biomedical Engineering, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

    J. D. Humphrey

  3. Vascular Biology and Therapeutics Program, Yale School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, USA

    J. D. Humphrey

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  1. C. J. Cyron
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Cyron, C.J., Humphrey, J.D. Growth and remodeling of load-bearing biological soft tissues. Meccanica 52, 645–664 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11012-016-0472-5

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