TY - JOUR A1 - Kotliar, Konstantin A1 - Ortner, Marion A1 - Conradi, Anna A1 - Hacker, Patricia A1 - Hauser, Christine A1 - Günthner, Roman A1 - Moser, Michaela A1 - Muggenthaler, Claudia A1 - Diehl-Schmid, Janine A1 - Priller, Josef A1 - Schmaderer, Christoph A1 - Grimmer, Timo T1 - Altered retinal cerebral vessel oscillation frequencies in Alzheimer's disease compatible with impaired amyloid clearance JF - Neurobiology of Aging N2 - Retinal vessels are similar to cerebral vessels in their structure and function. Moderately low oscillation frequencies of around 0.1 Hz have been reported as the driving force for paravascular drainage in gray matter in mice and are known as the frequencies of lymphatic vessels in humans. We aimed to elucidate whether retinal vessel oscillations are altered in Alzheimer's disease (AD) at the stage of dementia or mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Seventeen patients with mild-to-moderate dementia due to AD (ADD); 23 patients with MCI due to AD, and 18 cognitively healthy controls (HC) were examined using Dynamic Retinal Vessel Analyzer. Oscillatory temporal changes of retinal vessel diameters were evaluated using mathematical signal analysis. Especially at moderately low frequencies around 0.1 Hz, arterial oscillations in ADD and MCI significantly prevailed over HC oscillations and correlated with disease severity. The pronounced retinal arterial vasomotion at moderately low frequencies in the ADD and MCI groups would be compatible with the view of a compensatory upregulation of paravascular drainage in AD and strengthen the amyloid clearance hypothesis. KW - Alzheimer's disease KW - Retinal vessel analysis KW - Vasomotions KW - Pulsations KW - Mild cognitive impairment Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neurobiolaging.2022.08.012 SN - 0197-4580 VL - 120 SP - 117 EP - 127 PB - Elsevier CY - Amsterdam ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Werfel, Stanislas A1 - Günthner, Roman A1 - Hapfelmeier, Alexander A1 - Hanssen, Henner A1 - Kotliar, Konstantin A1 - Heemann, Uwe A1 - Schmaderer, Christoph ED - Guzik, Tomasz J. T1 - Identification of cardiovascular high-risk groups from dynamic retinal vessel signals using untargeted machine learning JF - Cardiovascular Research N2 - Dynamic retinal vessel analysis (DVA) provides a non-invasive way to assess microvascular function in patients and potentially to improve predictions of individual cardiovascular (CV) risk. The aim of our study was to use untargeted machine learning on DVA in order to improve CV mortality prediction and identify corresponding response alterations. KW - Machine learning KW - Retinal vessels KW - Microcirculation KW - Haemodialysis KW - Myocardial infarction and cardiac death Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1093/cvr/cvab040 SN - 0008-6363 VL - 118 IS - 2 SP - 612 EP - 621 PB - Oxford University Press CY - Oxford ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Uysal, Karya A1 - Creutz, Till A1 - Firat, Ipek Seda A1 - Artmann, Gerhard A1 - Teusch, Nicole A1 - Temiz Artmann, Aysegül T1 - Bio-functionalized ultra-thin, large-area and waterproof silicone membranes for biomechanical cellular loading and compliance experiments JF - Polymers N2 - Biocompatibility, flexibility and durability make polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) membranes top candidates in biomedical applications. CellDrum technology uses large area, <10 µm thin membranes as mechanical stress sensors of thin cell layers. For this to be successful, the properties (thickness, temperature, dust, wrinkles, etc.) must be precisely controlled. The following parameters of membrane fabrication by means of the Floating-on-Water (FoW) method were investigated: (1) PDMS volume, (2) ambient temperature, (3) membrane deflection and (4) membrane mechanical compliance. Significant differences were found between all PDMS volumes and thicknesses tested (p < 0.01). They also differed from the calculated values. At room temperatures between 22 and 26 °C, significant differences in average thickness values were found, as well as a continuous decrease in thicknesses within a 4 °C temperature elevation. No correlation was found between the membrane thickness groups (between 3–4 µm) in terms of deflection and compliance. We successfully present a fabrication method for thin bio-functionalized membranes in conjunction with a four-step quality management system. The results highlight the importance of tight regulation of production parameters through quality control. The use of membranes described here could also become the basis for material testing on thin, viscous layers such as polymers, dyes and adhesives, which goes far beyond biological applications. Y1 - 2022 SN - 2073-4360 VL - 14 IS - 11 SP - 2213 PB - MDPI CY - Basel ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Topçu, Murat A1 - Madabhushi, Gopal S.P. A1 - Staat, Manfred T1 - A generalized shear-lag theory for elastic stress transfer between matrix and fibres having a variable radius JF - International Journal of Solids and Structures N2 - A generalized shear-lag theory for fibres with variable radius is developed to analyse elastic fibre/matrix stress transfer. The theory accounts for the reinforcement of biological composites, such as soft tissue and bone tissue, as well as for the reinforcement of technical composite materials, such as fibre-reinforced polymers (FRP). The original shear-lag theory proposed by Cox in 1952 is generalized for fibres with variable radius and with symmetric and asymmetric ends. Analytical solutions are derived for the distribution of axial and interfacial shear stress in cylindrical and elliptical fibres, as well as conical and paraboloidal fibres with asymmetric ends. Additionally, the distribution of axial and interfacial shear stress for conical and paraboloidal fibres with symmetric ends are numerically predicted. The results are compared with solutions from axisymmetric finite element models. A parameter study is performed, to investigate the suitability of alternative fibre geometries for use in FRP. KW - Natural fibres KW - Polymer-matrix composites KW - Biocomposites KW - Stress concentrations KW - Finite element analysis Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijsolstr.2022.111464 SN - 0020-7683 VL - 239–240 IS - Art. No. 111464 PB - Elsevier CY - New York, NY ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Bhattarai, Aroj A1 - Horbach, Andreas A1 - Staat, Manfred A1 - Kowalczyk, Wojciech A1 - Tran, Thanh Ngoc T1 - Virgin passive colon biomechanics and a literature review of active contraction constitutive models JF - Biomechanics N2 - The objective of this paper is to present our findings on the biomechanical aspects of the virgin passive anisotropic hyperelasticity of the porcine colon based on equibiaxial tensile experiments. Firstly, the characterization of the intestine tissues is discussed for a nearly incompressible hyperelastic fiber-reinforced Holzapfel–Gasser–Ogden constitutive model in virgin passive loading conditions. The stability of the evaluated material parameters is checked for the polyconvexity of the adopted strain energy function using positive eigenvalue constraints of the Hessian matrix with MATLAB. The constitutive material description of the intestine with two collagen fibers in the submucosal and muscular layer each has been implemented in the FORTRAN platform of the commercial finite element software LS-DYNA, and two equibiaxial tensile simulations are presented to validate the results with the optical strain images obtained from the experiments. Furthermore, this paper also reviews the existing models of the active smooth muscle cells, but these models have not been computationally studied here. The review part shows that the constitutive models originally developed for the active contraction of skeletal muscle based on Hill’s three-element model, Murphy’s four-state cross-bridge chemical kinetic model and Huxley’s sliding-filament hypothesis, which are mainly used for arteries, are appropriate for numerical contraction numerical analysis of the large intestine. KW - virgin passive KW - strain energy function KW - smooth muscle contraction KW - viscoelasticity KW - damage Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.3390/biomechanics2020013 SN - 2673-7078 VL - 2 IS - 2 SP - 138 EP - 157 PB - MDPI CY - Basel ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Tran, Ngoc Trinh A1 - Trinh, Tu Luc A1 - Dao, Ngoc Tien A1 - Giap, Van Tan A1 - Truong, Manh Khuyen A1 - Dinh, Thuy Ha A1 - Staat, Manfred T1 - FEM shakedown analysis of structures under random strength with chance constrained programming JF - Vietnam Journal of Mechanics N2 - Direct methods, comprising limit and shakedown analysis, are a branch of computational mechanics. They play a significant role in mechanical and civil engineering design. The concept of direct methods aims to determine the ultimate load carrying capacity of structures beyond the elastic range. In practical problems, the direct methods lead to nonlinear convex optimization problems with a large number of variables and constraints. If strength and loading are random quantities, the shakedown analysis can be formulated as stochastic programming problem. In this paper, a method called chance constrained programming is presented, which is an effective method of stochastic programming to solve shakedown analysis problems under random conditions of strength. In this study, the loading is deterministic, and the strength is a normally or lognormally distributed variable. KW - limit analysis KW - shakedown analysis KW - chance constrained programming KW - stochastic programming KW - reliability of structures Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.15625/0866-7136/17943 SN - 0866-7136 SN - 2815-5882 VL - 44 IS - 4 SP - 459 EP - 473 PB - Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology (VAST) ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Engelmann, Ulrich M. A1 - Pourshahidi, Mohammad Ali A1 - Shalaby, Ahmed A1 - Krause, Hans-Joachim T1 - Probing particle size dependency of frequency mixing magnetic detection with dynamic relaxation simulation JF - Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials N2 - Biomedical applications of magnetic nanoparticles (MNP) fundamentally rely on the particles’ magnetic relaxation as a response to an alternating magnetic field. The magnetic relaxation complexly depends on the interplay of MNP magnetic and physical properties with the applied field parameters. It is commonly accepted that particle core size is a major contributor to signal generation in all the above applications, however, most MNP samples comprise broad distribution spanning nm and more. Therefore, precise knowledge of the exact contribution of individual core sizes to signal generation is desired for optimal MNP design generally for each application. Specifically, we present a magnetic relaxation simulation-driven analysis of experimental frequency mixing magnetic detection (FMMD) for biosensing to quantify the contributions of individual core size fractions towards signal generation. Applying our method to two different experimental MNP systems, we found the most dominant contributions from approx. 20 nm sized particles in the two independent MNP systems. Additional comparison between freely suspended and immobilized MNP also reveals insight in the MNP microstructure, allowing to use FMMD for MNP characterization, as well as to further fine-tune its applicability in biosensing. Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmmm.2022.169965 SN - 0304-8853 VL - 563 IS - In progress, Art. No. 169965 PB - Elsevier CY - Amsterdam ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Harris, Isaac A1 - Kleefeld, Andreas T1 - Analysis and computation of the transmission eigenvalues with a conductive boundary condition JF - Applicable Analysis N2 - We provide a new analytical and computational study of the transmission eigenvalues with a conductive boundary condition. These eigenvalues are derived from the scalar inverse scattering problem for an inhomogeneous material with a conductive boundary condition. The goal is to study how these eigenvalues depend on the material parameters in order to estimate the refractive index. The analytical questions we study are: deriving Faber–Krahn type lower bounds, the discreteness and limiting behavior of the transmission eigenvalues as the conductivity tends to infinity for a sign changing contrast. We also provide a numerical study of a new boundary integral equation for computing the eigenvalues. Lastly, using the limiting behavior we will numerically estimate the refractive index from the eigenvalues provided the conductivity is sufficiently large but unknown. KW - Boundary integral equations KW - Inverse spectral problem KW - Conductive boundary condition KW - Transmission eigenvalues Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/00036811.2020.1789598 SN - 1563-504X VL - 101 IS - 6 SP - 1880 EP - 1895 PB - Taylor & Francis CY - London ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Kleefeld, Andreas A1 - Zimmermann, M. ED - Constanda, Christian ED - Bodmann, Bardo E.J. ED - Harris, Paul J. T1 - Computing Elastic Interior Transmission Eigenvalues JF - Integral Methods in Science and Engineering N2 - An alternative method is presented to numerically compute interior elastic transmission eigenvalues for various domains in two dimensions. This is achieved by discretizing the resulting system of boundary integral equations in combination with a nonlinear eigenvalue solver. Numerical results are given to show that this new approach can provide better results than the finite element method when dealing with general domains. Y1 - 2022 SN - 978-3-031-07171-3 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-07171-3_10 N1 - Corresponding author: Andreas Kleefeld SP - 139 EP - 155 PB - Birkhäuser CY - Cham ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Uysal, Karya A1 - Firat, Ipek Serat A1 - Creutz, Till A1 - Aydin, Inci Cansu A1 - Artmann, Gerhard A1 - Teusch, Nicole A1 - Temiz Artmann, Aysegül T1 - A novel in vitro wound healing assay using free-standing, ultra-thin PDMS membranes JF - membranes N2 - Advances in polymer science have significantly increased polymer applications in life sciences. We report the use of free-standing, ultra-thin polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) membranes, called CellDrum, as cell culture substrates for an in vitro wound model. Dermal fibroblast monolayers from 28- and 88-year-old donors were cultured on CellDrums. By using stainless steel balls, circular cell-free areas were created in the cell layer (wounding). Sinusoidal strain of 1 Hz, 5% strain, was applied to membranes for 30 min in 4 sessions. The gap circumference and closure rate of un-stretched samples (controls) and stretched samples were monitored over 4 days to investigate the effects of donor age and mechanical strain on wound closure. A significant decrease in gap circumference and an increase in gap closure rate were observed in trained samples from younger donors and control samples from older donors. In contrast, a significant decrease in gap closure rate and an increase in wound circumference were observed in the trained samples from older donors. Through these results, we propose the model of a cell monolayer on stretchable CellDrums as a practical tool for wound healing research. The combination of biomechanical cell loading in conjunction with analyses such as gene/protein expression seems promising beyond the scope published here. Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.3390/membranes13010022 N1 - This article belongs to the Special Issue "Latest Scientific Discoveries in Polymer Membranes" VL - 2023 IS - 13(1) PB - MDPI CY - Basel ER -