Regensburg 2007 – scientific programme
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MM: Fachverband Metall- und Materialphysik
MM 35: SYBM Bioinspired Materials
MM 35.14: Talk
Thursday, March 29, 2007, 18:30–18:45, H16
The cytoskeleton as an example of a highly adaptive structure — Florent Dalmas1,2 and •Camilla Mohrdieck1,3 — 1Max Planck Institute for Metals Research, Stuttgart, Germany — 2Present Address: Laboratoire de Recherche sur les Polymères, CNRS - UMR 7581, 94320 Thiais, France — 3Inst. for Physical Metallurgy, University of Stuttgart, Germany
The internal polymer network of eukaryotic cells, the cytoskeleton, is a very interesting example of a smart structure that integrates sensors, actuators and control systems to perform many vital cellular functions. It is able to adapt and respond to a large variety of intra and extra-cellular stimuli efficiently and often also interactively. This agility is largely due to a variety of molecules that bind to cytoskeletal fibers to execute certain functions, e.g. crosslinking the fibers. To mimic the adaptiveness of the cytoskeleton in engineered structures, it is necessary to identify the components that act as sensors or actuators and how they interplay.
To address this complex issue, we have focused on the effect of crosslinking on the mechanical stability and the adaptiveness of the cytoskeleton. In a new modeling approach, we describe the cytoskeletal fibers and the molecules that crosslink them into a three dimensional network as homogeneous straight beams in a constant volume. The response to a mechanical stimulus is simulated by subjecting the network to a homogeneous shear stress and calculating its shear modulus. New scaling behaviors of the shear modulus are found and analysed. They indicate general design principles of adaptive networks.