Dan Shiwarski, Josh Tashman, Alkiviadis Tsamis, Jaci Bliley, Malachi Blundon, Edgar Aranda-Michel, Quentin Jallerat, John Szymanski, Brooke McCartney and Adam Feinberg are co-authors on our recent article in Nature Communications entitled “Fibronectin-Based Nanomechanical Biosensors to Map 3D Strains in Live Cells and Tissues.” The ability to measure strain in cells and tissues in vitro with minimal perturbation and at high spatial resolution has proven challenging. Here, we have developed a fluorescently-labelled nanomechanical biosensor (NMBS) made of a fibronectin square lattice mesh with tunable resolution that can be applied to the surface of cells and tissues to enable direct quantification and mapping of strain over time. Additionally, we have released an open-source MATLAB and Imaris biomechanics software package to map and quantify 3D surface strain, cardiomyocyte beat frequency, and area dilation from live fluorescence imaging data. Accompanying the manuscript is a published protocol detailing the step-by-step NMBS fabrication process.
Read the article at Nature Communications
