Human mitral valve chordae tendineae in which elastic response curves are nonlinear have also been found to exhibit extensibility that increases with chordal size and decreases with chordal age. We used selective enzymatic digestion and scanning transmission electron microscopy to explain these observations. Removal of the outer elastin sheath by enzymatic digestion did not significantly affect...

Aging and the related changes in mechanical behavior of hard tissues of the human body are becoming increasingly important. In this study the influence of aging on the mechanical behavior of human enamel was evaluated using 3rd molars from young (18 < or = age < or = 30 years) and old (55 < or = age) patients. The hardness and elastic modulus were quantified using nanoindentation as a function ...

We hypothesized that age-linked changes in the composition and elastic properties of the arterial wall occur earlier in hypertensive than in normotensive rats. We evaluated the consequences of hypertension and aging on aortic mechanics, geometry, and composition in 3-, 9-, and 15-month-old awake Wistar-Kyoto rats (WKY) (normotensive) and spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR) (hypertensive). The...

OBJECTIVE Velocity-vector imaging (VVI) represents a valuable new method for noninvasive quantification of vascular properties associated with aging. The purpose of this study was to assess the correlations between VVI parameters and histological changes with aging. APPROACH AND RESULTS Fourteen mongrel dogs were classified as either young (n=7; age, 1-2 years; female; weighing 22-29 kg) or s...

The authors studied the posterior attachment of the ciliary muscle in seven young (3-10 yr) and five old (26-34 yr) rhesus monkeys by light microscopy and electron microscopy. Posterior attachment of the muscle bundles consisted of elastic tendons, exclusively. The elastic tendons were continuous with the elastic lamina of Bruch's membrane and were also connected by smaller elastic fibers to an...

Dynamic balance ability related to maintaining postural stability during movement is closely tied to fall risk in the elderly. The functional reach (FR) test has been developed to evaluate their dynamic balance. Although a simple and new FR test using an elastic stick has been proposed by modifying the above original FR test, the abilities related to both FR tests are judged to differ because o...

In-vivo characterization of soft tissue is a key step towards accurate biomechanical simulation enabling planning and intra-operative assisted surgery. This chapter presents the new version of LASTIC, a device measuring soft tissue deformations using a negative pressure. Its capabilities are compared with standard tensile tests on five samples with different elastic properties, i.e Young modulu...

We show by atomistic simulations that, in the thermodynamic limit, the in-plane elastic moduli of graphene at finite temperature vanish with system size L as a power law L(-η(u)) with η(u)≃0.325, in agreement with the membrane theory. We provide explicit expressions for the size and strain dependence of graphene's elastic moduli, allowing comparison to experimental data. Our results explain the...

BACKGROUND Decreased arterial elasticity is a risk factor for several cardiovascular outcomes. Longitudinal data on the effect of physical activity in youth on adult arterial elasticity are limited. The aim of this study was to determine the long-term effects of physical activity in children and young adults on carotid artery elasticity after 21 years of follow-up. METHODS AND RESULTS Partici...