Soft matter physics: Tools and mechanical models for living cellular aggregates

Abstract

Tissues belong to the broad field of active matter, a novel class of non-equilibrium materials composed of many interacting units that individually consume energy and collectively generate motion or mechanical stresses. Active systems span an enormous range of length scales, from individual living cells, to tissues and organisms, to animal groups. We introduce the concept of biological tissues as examples of entangled active matter, where the units (cell) are bound by transient links. We focus here on the mechanical properties (surface tension, elasticity, and viscosity) of cells and tissues derived from measurements performed by the pipette aspiration technique. This approach has been very fruitful in unveiling striking analogies between the physics of inert soft matter (polymer, viscous pastes, and Silly Putty®) and the behavior of biological tissues. The results obtained from such analogies suggest important implications in the fields of tissue engineering and development.