. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2018 Jun 1.

Published in final edited form as: Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol. 2017 Nov 8;18(12):728–742. doi: 10.1038/nrm.2017.108

Table 1.

Representative mechanical properties of tissue and materials

Tissue Type	Tissue or Material	Typical Applications	E (kPa)	t_1/2 (s)
Interstitial and connective	Fat	-	0.02¹⁴⁷	100⁴⁷
	Tendon	-	310,000¹⁴⁷	1¹⁴⁹
	Skin	-	4.5–8¹⁴⁸	-
Vascular	Carotid artery	-	90¹⁴⁷	-
Nervous	Spinal cord	-	27–89¹⁴⁷	-
Nervous	Brain	-	0.2–1.0^147,150	100⁴⁷
Viscera	Lung	-	5¹⁴⁷	-
	Kidney	-	2.5¹⁴⁷	-
	Liver	-	0.64¹⁴⁷	100⁴⁷
	Lymph node	-	0.12¹⁴⁷	-
	Mammary gland	-	0.16¹⁴⁷	-
Musculoskeletal	Cardiac muscle	-	20–150¹⁴⁷	-
	Skeletal muscle	-	10–100^147,150	-
	Pre-calcified bone	-	30¹⁵⁰	-
	Bone marrow	-	0.3–24.7¹⁵¹	10⁴⁷
	Cartilage	-	20¹⁵⁰	-
	Articular cartilage	-	950¹⁴⁷	-
	Bone - Cancellous	-	350,000¹⁵²	-
	Bone – Compact	-	11,500,000¹⁵²	-
	Tooth dentin	-	>10,000,000¹⁵³	-
	Tooth enamel	-	~100,000,000¹⁵³	-
Embryonic	Gastrulation	-	0.01¹⁵⁴	-
Natural ECM	Collagen hydrogels	-	0.01–6^155,158	1¹⁵⁵
	Fibrin hydrogels	-	0.01–0.5¹⁵⁵	1¹⁵⁵
	rBM (Matrigel)	-	0.01–0.5¹⁵⁵	50¹⁵⁵
	Gelatin – covalently crosslinked	-	0.6–13¹⁵⁶	n/a
	Hyaluronic acid hydrogels	-	4–95⁴⁵	n/a
Synthetic matrix	Alginate hydrogels	2D and 3D matrices, programmable viscoelastic properties, coupled with cell adhesive ligands or interpenetrating network with natural ECM, option for degradability	0.1–110^44,47	44–3300⁴⁷
	Polyacrylamide	2D elastic substrates coated with ECM	0.1–40⁵⁴	n/a
	Agarose hydrogels	2D elastic substrates coated with ECM	5–100^44,155	>1000¹⁵⁵
	Poly(ethylene glycol) hydrogels	Covalently-crosslinked 2D and 3D matrices, coupled with cell adhesive ligands, incorporation of degradable elements	0.1–160^44,110	n/a
	Polystyrene	Traditional tissue culture material (plasma-treated for promoting cell adhesion)	3,000,000¹²⁵	n/a
	PDMS	2D elastomer for applying extrinsic strain	5–100¹¹⁵	n/a
	PDMS micropillars	2D studies to measure and/or manipulate cell intrinsic forces	2.8–60¹⁵⁷^*	n/a

Values = X^Reference, E = Elastic modulus (assume E = 2G′ (1+ ν), G′ storage modulus, ν = 0.5), t_1/2 = time to reach half of initial normalized stress during constant applied strain (Box 1), rBM = recombinant basement membrane, PDMS = polydimethylsiloxane; - indicates value not reported

Effective elastic modulus, E^eff