Artery Research

Volume 8, Issue 1, March 2014, Pages 1 - 8

In vitro characterisation of arterial stiffening: From the macro- to the nano-scale

Authors
Riaz Akhtar*
Centre for Materials and Structures, School of Engineering, University of Liverpool, Brownlow Hill, Liverpool L69 3GH, UK
*Tel.: +44 151 794 5770; fax: +44 151 794 4703. E-mail address: r.akhtar@liverpool.ac.uk.
Corresponding Author
Riaz Akhtar
Available Online 26 January 2014.
DOI
10.1016/j.artres.2014.01.002How to use a DOI?
Keywords
Material properties; In vitro mechanical testing; Arterial stiffening; Tensile testing; Nanoindentation; Atomic force microscopy; Scanning acoustic microscopy; Ageing
Abstract

Accurate measurement of the material properties of arterial tissue is important for better characterisation of diseases and the development of reliable computational models. There are a number of in vitro techniques that are applied to study the biomechanical properties of arterial tissue. This review article presents data obtained using tensile testing, nanoindentation, scanning acoustic microscopy (SAM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). Each of these techniques provides material property information at a different spatial resolution and in many ways are complementary techniques. The lack of consensus in the literature with regard to the appropriate stress and strain definitions that should be used when reporting tensile testing data is also highlighted. The potential of higher spatial resolution techniques, which provide data at micro-scale (nanoindentation and SAM) and nano-scale (AFM) for application to the characterisation of human aortic tissue are discussed. Finally, studies, which have examined age-related changed in the aorta at these different length scales, are highlighted.

Copyright
© 2014 Association for Research into Arterial Structure and Physiology. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Open Access
This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC license.

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Journal
Artery Research
Volume-Issue
8 - 1
Pages
1 - 8
Publication Date
2014/01/26
ISSN (Online)
1876-4401
ISSN (Print)
1872-9312
DOI
10.1016/j.artres.2014.01.002How to use a DOI?
Copyright
© 2014 Association for Research into Arterial Structure and Physiology. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Open Access
This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC license.

Cite this article

TY  - JOUR
AU  - Riaz Akhtar
PY  - 2014
DA  - 2014/01/26
TI  - In vitro characterisation of arterial stiffening: From the macro- to the nano-scale
JO  - Artery Research
SP  - 1
EP  - 8
VL  - 8
IS  - 1
SN  - 1876-4401
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.artres.2014.01.002
DO  - 10.1016/j.artres.2014.01.002
ID  - Akhtar2014
ER  -