Simple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology

Abstract In spite of tremendous advances made in the comprehension of mechanotransduction, implementation of mechanobiology assays remains challenging for the broad community of cell biologists. Hydrogel substrates with tunable stiffness are essential tool in mechanobiology, allowing to investigate...

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Autores principales: Alessandro Gandin, Yaswanth Murugesan, Veronica Torresan, Lorenzo Ulliana, Anna Citron, Paolo Contessotto, Giusy Battilana, Tito Panciera, Maurizio Ventre, A. Paolo Netti, Lucia Nicola, Stefano Piccolo, Giovanna Brusatin
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Lenguaje:EN
Publicado: Nature Portfolio 2021
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Acceso en línea:https://doaj.org/article/92689fff4621487898791648086db563
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spelling oai:doaj.org-article:92689fff4621487898791648086db5632021-11-28T12:21:44ZSimple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology10.1038/s41598-021-01036-52045-2322https://doaj.org/article/92689fff4621487898791648086db5632021-11-01T00:00:00Zhttps://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-01036-5https://doaj.org/toc/2045-2322Abstract In spite of tremendous advances made in the comprehension of mechanotransduction, implementation of mechanobiology assays remains challenging for the broad community of cell biologists. Hydrogel substrates with tunable stiffness are essential tool in mechanobiology, allowing to investigate the effects of mechanical signals on cell behavior. A bottleneck that slows down the popularization of hydrogel formulations for mechanobiology is the assessment of their stiffness, typically requiring expensive and sophisticated methodologies in the domain of material science. Here we overcome such barriers offering the reader protocols to set-up and interpret two straightforward, low cost and high-throughput tools to measure hydrogel stiffness: static macroindentation and micropipette aspiration. We advanced on how to build up these tools and on the underlying theoretical modeling. Specifically, we validated our tools by comparing them with leading techniques used for measuring hydrogel stiffness (atomic force microscopy, uniaxial compression and rheometric analysis) with consistent results on PAA hydrogels or their modification. In so doing, we also took advantage of YAP/TAZ nuclear localization as biologically validated and sensitive readers of mechanosensing, all in all presenting a suite of biologically and theoretically proven protocols to be implemented in most biological laboratories to approach mechanobiology.Alessandro GandinYaswanth MurugesanVeronica TorresanLorenzo UllianaAnna CitronPaolo ContessottoGiusy BattilanaTito PancieraMaurizio VentreA. Paolo NettiLucia NicolaStefano PiccoloGiovanna BrusatinNature PortfolioarticleMedicineRScienceQENScientific Reports, Vol 11, Iss 1, Pp 1-17 (2021)
institution DOAJ
collection DOAJ
language EN
topic Medicine
R
Science
Q
spellingShingle Medicine
R
Science
Q
Alessandro Gandin
Yaswanth Murugesan
Veronica Torresan
Lorenzo Ulliana
Anna Citron
Paolo Contessotto
Giusy Battilana
Tito Panciera
Maurizio Ventre
A. Paolo Netti
Lucia Nicola
Stefano Piccolo
Giovanna Brusatin
Simple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology
description Abstract In spite of tremendous advances made in the comprehension of mechanotransduction, implementation of mechanobiology assays remains challenging for the broad community of cell biologists. Hydrogel substrates with tunable stiffness are essential tool in mechanobiology, allowing to investigate the effects of mechanical signals on cell behavior. A bottleneck that slows down the popularization of hydrogel formulations for mechanobiology is the assessment of their stiffness, typically requiring expensive and sophisticated methodologies in the domain of material science. Here we overcome such barriers offering the reader protocols to set-up and interpret two straightforward, low cost and high-throughput tools to measure hydrogel stiffness: static macroindentation and micropipette aspiration. We advanced on how to build up these tools and on the underlying theoretical modeling. Specifically, we validated our tools by comparing them with leading techniques used for measuring hydrogel stiffness (atomic force microscopy, uniaxial compression and rheometric analysis) with consistent results on PAA hydrogels or their modification. In so doing, we also took advantage of YAP/TAZ nuclear localization as biologically validated and sensitive readers of mechanosensing, all in all presenting a suite of biologically and theoretically proven protocols to be implemented in most biological laboratories to approach mechanobiology.
format article
author Alessandro Gandin
Yaswanth Murugesan
Veronica Torresan
Lorenzo Ulliana
Anna Citron
Paolo Contessotto
Giusy Battilana
Tito Panciera
Maurizio Ventre
A. Paolo Netti
Lucia Nicola
Stefano Piccolo
Giovanna Brusatin
author_facet Alessandro Gandin
Yaswanth Murugesan
Veronica Torresan
Lorenzo Ulliana
Anna Citron
Paolo Contessotto
Giusy Battilana
Tito Panciera
Maurizio Ventre
A. Paolo Netti
Lucia Nicola
Stefano Piccolo
Giovanna Brusatin
author_sort Alessandro Gandin
title Simple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology
title_short Simple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology
title_full Simple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology
title_fullStr Simple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology
title_full_unstemmed Simple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology
title_sort simple yet effective methods to probe hydrogel stiffness for mechanobiology
publisher Nature Portfolio
publishDate 2021
url https://doaj.org/article/92689fff4621487898791648086db563
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