Fig. 5.

Stiffening due to the inhomogeneous strain induced by the presence of the knobs ($\alpha =0.35$). (A) Inhomogeneous shear strain distribution in the spectrin network. The shear strain in the knob-free regions is much higher than that applied, representing a stiffening mechanism due to the strain-hardening property of the spectrin network. (B) The average shear strain in the knob-free regions is ${\gamma }_F=1.44$, whereas that in the knobby regions is ${\gamma }_K=0.74$ at an applied shear strain ${\gamma }_C=1$. The shear strain in the normal spectrin network (without knobs) is homogeneous and consistent with the applied shear strain.