A STUDY OF TENSILE CYCLIC LOADING ON THE MORPHOLOGY OF CULTURED ENDOTHELIAL CELLS WITH APPLICATIONS OF FRACTAL ANALYSIS

Morphological remodeling of endothelial cells induced by blood flow and pressure is considered as an adaptive response to mechanical stimuli. To determine the mechanism of response, we examined the change in the morphology of endothelial cells caused by cyclic strain. Here, we have described a new, digital image analysis method that has been adapted to evaluate fractal dimension of cellular profiles as a measure of morphological complexity. The fractal dimension seemed to be a suitable parameter for the analysis of morphological changes of endothelial cells caused by mechanical parameters such as cyclic stretch due to blood pressure.

Keywords:

endothelial cells , cyclic strain , fractal dimension , cell morphology , image analysis