Nanotraction as an Alternative Tool for Local Tissue Characterization

The newly developed Nanotraction method applies tensile forces to soft materials at the micrometre scale. It utilizes the FluidFM system to apply suction pressures through micrometre-sized cylindrical tubes [1]. This suction pressure allows for a clamp to be created on the surface of the soft material, such that it can then be retracted. The force-displacement curves can then be analyzed to study how various materials respond to these tensile forces. This method is specifically beneficial for fibrous materials which often exhibit a tension-compression nonlinearity, meaning that they do not respond the same way to tensile forces as they do to compressive forces. This method has been successfully applied to collagen hydrogels, enabling an improved understanding of their behaviour on the micrometre scale. This length scale is particularly relevant for cells, which are mechanoresponsive and can behave differently depending on the mechanical environment in which they reside. Hence, these measurements may be especially useful for the study of fibrotic diseases, in which the interplay between cells and their environment is a crucial aspect of the pathophysiology [2].