Sharif Digital Repository

Background: Comparison of the kinematic variability and dynamic stability of the trunk between healthy and low back pain patient groups can contribute to gaining valuable information about the movement patterns and neuromotor strategies involved in various movement tasks. Methods: Fourteen chronic low back pain patients with mild symptoms and twelve healthy male volunteers performed repeated trunk flexion-extension movements in the sagittal plane at three different speeds: 20 cycles/min, self-selected, and 40 cycles/min. Mean standard deviations, coefficient of variation and variance ratio as variability measures; maximum finite-time Lyapunov exponents and maximum Floquet multipliers as... 

Organ-on-a-chip technology tries to mimic the complexity of native tissues in vitro. Important progress has recently been made in using this technology to study the gut with and without microbiota. These in vitro models can serve as an alternative to animal models for studying physiology, pathology, and pharmacology. While these models have greater physiological relevance than two-dimensional (2D) cell systems in vitro, endocrine and immunological functions in gut-on-a-chip models are still poorly represented. Furthermore, the construction of complex models, in which different cell types and structures interact, remains a challenge. Generally, gut-on-a-chip models have the potential to... 

The successful clinical application of patient-specific personalized medicine for the management of low back patients remains elusive. This study aimed to classify chronic nonspecific low back pain (NSLBP) patients using our previously developed and validated wearable inertial sensor (SHARIF-HMIS) for the assessment of trunk kinematic parameters. One hundred NSLBP patients consented to perform repetitive flexural movements in five different planes of motion (PLM): 0◦ in the sagittal plane, as well as 15◦ and 30◦ lateral rotation to the right and left, respectively. They were divided into three subgroups based on the STarT Back Screening Tool. The sensor was placed on the trunk of each... 

Understanding the foreign body response (FBR) and desiging strategies to modulate such a response represent a grand challenge for implant devices and biomaterials. Here, the development of a microfluidic platform is reported, i.e., the FBR-on-a-chip (FBROC) for modeling the cascade of events during immune cell response to implants. The platform models the native implant microenvironment where the implants are interfaced directly with surrounding tissues, as well as vasculature with circulating immune cells. The study demonstrates that the release of cytokines such as monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 (MCP-1) from the extracellular matrix (ECM)-like hydrogels in the bottom tissue chamber... 

We report the development of a metastasis-on-a-chip platform to model and track hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC)–bone metastasis and to analyze the inhibitory effect of an herb-based compound, thymoquinone (TQ), in hindering the migration of liver cancer cells into the bone compartment. The bioreactor consisted of two chambers, one accommodating encapsulated HepG2 cells and one bone-mimetic niche containing hydroxyapatite (HAp). Above these chambers, a microporous membrane was placed to resemble the vascular barrier, where medium was circulated over the membrane. It was observed that the liver cancer cells proliferated inside the tumor microtissue and disseminated from the HCC chamber to the...