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Updated: Feb 8, 2026

In Vivo Evaluation of the Mechanical and Viscoelastic Properties of the Rat Tongue
Published on: July 6, 2017
Viscoelastic properties of vimentin originate from nonequilibrium conformational changes
Johanna Block1, Hannes Witt2, Andrea Candelli3,4
1Institute for X-Ray Physics, University of Goettingen, 37077 Göttingen, Germany.
Abstract:
Structure and dynamics of living matter rely on design principles fundamentally different from concepts of traditional material science. Specialized intracellular filaments in the cytoskeleton permit living systems to divide, migrate, and grow with a high degree of variability and durability. Among the three filament systems, microfilaments, microtubules, and intermediate filaments (IFs), the physical properties of IFs and their role in cellular mechanics are the least well understood. We use optical trapping of individual vimentin filaments to investigate energy dissipation, strain history dependence, and creep behavior of stretched filaments. By stochastic and numerical modeling, we link our experimental observations to the peculiar molecular architecture of IFs. We find that individual vimentin filaments display tensile memory and are able to dissipate more than 70% of the input energy. We attribute these phenomena to distinct nonequilibrium folding and unfolding of α helices in the vimentin monomers constituting the filaments.
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