Rheology of airway smooth muscle cells is associated with cytoskeletal contractile stress

1 Department of Biomedical Engineering, Boston University, and 2 Physiology Program, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachussetts 02115 Submitted 10 June 2003 ; accepted in final form 31 December 2003 Recently reported data from mechanical measurements of cultured airway smooth muscle cel...

Full description

Saved in:

Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Journal of applied physiology (1985) Vol. 96; no. 5; pp. 1600 - 1605
Main Authors:	Stamenovic, Dimitrije, Suki, Bela, Fabry, Ben, Wang, Ning, Fredberg, Jeffrey J, Buy, Julie E
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	English
Published:	Bethesda, MD Am Physiological Soc 01-05-2004 American Physiological Society
Subjects:	Biological and medical sciences Cell cycle Cellular biology Cytoskeleton - physiology Elasticity Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology Humans Models, Biological Muscle Contraction - physiology Muscular system Myocytes, Smooth Muscle - physiology Rheology Stress, Mechanical Trachea - physiology Rheology Contractility Smooth muscle mechanics Respiratory system Stress power law Respiratory tract Cytometry Vertebrata Mammalia Stiffness Power
Online Access:	Get full text
Tags:	Add Tag No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!

Description
Summary:	1 Department of Biomedical Engineering, Boston University, and 2 Physiology Program, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachussetts 02115 Submitted 10 June 2003 ; accepted in final form 31 December 2003 Recently reported data from mechanical measurements of cultured airway smooth muscle cells show that stiffness of the cytoskeletal matrix is determined by the extent of static contractile stress borne by the cytoskeleton (Wang N, Toli -Nørrelykke IM, Chen J, Mijailovich SM, Butler JP, Fredberg JJ, and Stamenovi D. Am J Physiol Cell Physiol 282, C606-C616, 2002). On the other hand, rheological measurements on these cells show that cytoskeletal stiffness changes with frequency of imposed mechanical loading according to a power law (Fabry B, Maksym GN, Butler JP, Glogauer M, Navajas DF, and Fredberg JJ. Phys Rev Lett 87: 148102, 2001). In this study, we examine the possibility that these two empirical observations might be interrelated. We combine previously reported data for contractile stress of human airway smooth muscle cells with new data describing rheological properties of these cells and derive quantitative, mathematically tractable, and experimentally verifiable empirical relationships between contractile stress and indexes of cell rheology. These findings reveal an intriguing role of the contractile stress: although it maintains structural stability of the cell under applied mechanical loads, it may also regulate rheological properties of the cytoskeleton, which are essential for other cell functions. contractility; power law; stiffness; cytometry; mechanics Address for reprint requests and other correspondence: D. Stamenovi , Dept. of Biomedical Engineering, Boston Univ., 44 Cummington St., Boston, MA 02215 (E-mail: dimitrij{at}engc.bu.edu ).
Bibliography:	ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23
ISSN:	8750-7587 1522-1601
DOI:	10.1152/japplphysiol.00595.2003