Soft-tissue-mimicking using hydrogels for the development of phantoms
With the currently available materials and technologies it is difficult to mimic the mechanical properties of soft living tissues. Additionally, another significant problem is the lack of information about the mechanical properties of these tissues. Alternatively, the use of phantoms offers a promis...
| Autores: | , , , , , , |
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| Tipo de recurso: | artículo |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2022 |
| País: | España |
| Institución: | Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) |
| Repositorio: | UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC |
| Idioma: | inglés |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:upcommons.upc.edu:2117/369458 |
| Acceso en línea: | https://hdl.handle.net/2117/369458 https://dx.doi.org/10.3390/gels8010040 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | Tissues--Mechanical properties Dynamic mechanical analysis Hardness Hydrogels Materials Mimicking Soft tissues Tissue scaffolding Viscoelasticity Warner–Braztler shear test Teixits--Propietats mecàniques Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Enginyeria mecànica |
| Sumario: | With the currently available materials and technologies it is difficult to mimic the mechanical properties of soft living tissues. Additionally, another significant problem is the lack of information about the mechanical properties of these tissues. Alternatively, the use of phantoms offers a promising solution to simulate biological bodies. For this reason, to advance in the state-of-the-art a wide range of organs (e.g., liver, heart, kidney as well as brain) and hydrogels (e.g., agarose, polyvinyl alcohol –PVA–, Phytagel –PHY– and methacrylate gelatine –GelMA–) were tested regarding their mechanical properties. For that, viscoelastic behavior, hardness, as well as a non-linear elastic mechanical response were measured. It was seen that there was a significant difference among the results for the different mentioned soft tissues. Some of them appear to be more elastic than viscous as well as being softer or harder. With all this information in mind, a correlation between the mechanical properties of the organs and the different materials was performed. The next conclusions were drawn: (1) to mimic the liver, the best material is 1% wt agarose; (2) to mimic the heart, the best material is 2% wt agarose; (3) to mimic the kidney, the best material is 4% wt GelMA; and (4) to mimic the brain, the best materials are 4% wt GelMA and 1% wt agarose. Neither PVA nor PHY was selected to mimic any of the studied tissues. |
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