Junker Håvar J, Thumm Bettina, Halvachizadeh Sascha, Mazza Edoardo
Present address: Institute for Mechanical Systems, Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering, ETH Zurich, Leonhardstrasse 21, Zurich, 8092 Switzerland.
Department of Trauma, University Hospital Zurich, Rämistrasse 100, Zurich, 8091 Switzerland.
Mech Soft Mater. 2023;5(1):5. doi: 10.1007/s42558-023-00053-w. Epub 2023 Jul 17.
Non-invasive skin characterization devices are emerging as a valuable tool in clinical skin research. In recent years, the range of available experimental techniques and methods used to determine the biomechanical properties of skin has increased considerably. Although a substantial amount of work has been devoted to assessing the working principle of macroscopic skin characterization devices individually, a rationalization and comparison between them is still lacking. This motivated the present study, which aimed to characterize and compare three commonly used working principles: suction, dynamic shear loading, and indentation. A synthetic model system with tunable mechanical properties was used to assess the three devices, and the results rationalized based on corresponding finite element models. In vivo measurements were performed on healthy volunteers to investigate the capability of differentiating the biomechanical properties of skin at different body locations, and to assess the intra- and inter-rater reliability of each device. The present comparative analysis indicates that the analyzed functional principles perceive the stiffness of human skin differently, with relevant implications for the interpretation of the respective measurement results.
非侵入性皮肤表征设备正在成为临床皮肤研究中的一种有价值的工具。近年来，用于确定皮肤生物力学特性的可用实验技术和方法的范围有了显著增加。尽管已经投入了大量工作来单独评估宏观皮肤表征设备的工作原理，但它们之间仍缺乏合理的比较。这激发了本研究，其旨在表征和比较三种常用的工作原理：吸力、动态剪切加载和压痕。使用具有可调机械性能的合成模型系统来评估这三种设备，并基于相应的有限元模型对结果进行合理化分析。对健康志愿者进行了体内测量，以研究区分不同身体部位皮肤生物力学特性的能力，并评估每种设备的评分者内和评分者间可靠性。目前的比较分析表明，所分析的功能原理对人体皮肤硬度的感知不同，这对各自测量结果的解释具有相关影响。
