Three types of analyses are combined to investigate the effect of missing fibers in periodic continuous fiber composites that are subjected to thermomechanical loadings. The representative cell method is employed in the first analysis for the construction of Green’s functions elastic fields for the fiber–matrix interfacial jumps problem. As a result, the infinite domain problem is reduced, in c...

The dynamic mechanical properties of lung tissue and its contents of collagen and elastic fibers were studied in strips prepared from mice instilled intratracheally with saline (C) or silica [15 (S15) and 30 days (S30) after instillation]. Resistance, elastance, and hysteresivity were studied during oscillations at different frequencies on S15 and S30. Elastance increased from C to silica group...

Homozygous or compound heterozygous mutations in fibulin-4 (FBLN4) lead to autosomal recessive cutis laxa type 1B (ARCL1B), a multisystem disorder characterized by significant cardiovascular abnormalities, including abnormal elastin assembly, arterial tortuosity, and aortic aneurysms. We sought to determine the consequences of a human disease-causing mutation in FBLN4 (E57K) on the cardiovascul...

Biological materials typically consist of elastic fibers immersed in an incompressible aqueous milieu. We consider the generality of an elastic material expressed as a fiberreinforced incompressible fluid. We show that, in the linear regime, any (possibly inhomogeneous and/or anisotropic) incompressible elastic material can be represented as a collection of fifteen families of straight, paralle...

We study numerically the failure of an interface joining two elastic materials under load using a fiber bundle model connected to an elastic half space. We find that the breakdown process follows the equal load sharing fiber bundle model without any detectable spatial correlations between the positions of the failing fibers until localization sets in. Depending on the elastic constant describin...

In the present study, the presence of extracellular matrix components, including collagenous and elastic fibers, and the expression of their key regulating enzymes, were investigated in different stages of hamster tongue carcinoma development. Immunohistochemical and computer-assisted morphological analyses were performed to quantify the staining intensity and area (integral optical density) of...

In order to facilitate locomotion and limb movement many animals store energy elastically in their tendons. In the turkey, much of the force generated by the gastrocnemius muscle is stored as elastic energy during tendon deformation and not within the muscle. As limbs move, the tendons are strained causing the collagen fibers in the extracellular matrices to be strained. During growth, avian te...

Great arteries, as well as lungs and skin, contain elastic fibers as important components to maintain their physiological functions. Although recent studies have revealed that a glycoprotein fibulin-4 (FBLN4) is indispensable for the assembly of mature elastic fibers, it remains to be elucidated how FBLN4 takes part in elastogenesis. Here, we report a dose-dependent requirement for FBLN4 in the...

A comparison of a number of texts, descriptive of the structure of the elastic intima-the fenestrated membrane of Henleof arteries, reveals the fact that the views concerning the structure of this layer are byno means unanimous. Schafer‘ speaks of the elastic intima as follows: “The elastic tissue is represented by one distinct lamina, which is separated from the endothelium by the subendotheli...

Pulmonary remodeling is an important feature of asthma physiopathology that can contribute to irreversible changes in lung function. Although neurokinins influence lung inflammation, their exact role in the extracellular matrix (ECM) remodeling remains to be determined. Our objective was to investigate whether inactivation of capsaicin-sensitive nerves modulates pulmonary ECM remodeling in anim...