Biomechanics regulators of musculoskeletal growth

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About this Research Topic

Submission deadlines

  1. Manuscript Summary Submission Deadline 1 May 2025 | Manuscript Submission Deadline 31 August 2025

  2. This Research Topic is still accepting articles.

    1. Check author guidelines

Background

The musculoskeletal system plays a fundamental role of providing support to the body and allowing movements. It comprises soft and hard organs and tissues that simultaneously resist mechanical loads and adapt to the loads during growth. Understanding the biomechanics and mechanobiology of these tissues is crucial to better understand the vertebrate musculoskeletal system during growth, augment performances at different ages, develop age-specific clinical strategies for disease and disorders, and advance biomimetic materials.

This Research Topic aims to highlight new and exciting research on the mechanical regulation acting during growth at the multi-scale levels of hard and soft tissues and organs of the musculoskeletal system. The overarching goal of this Research Topic is to feature new ideas, tools, and findings that fill the gaps in understanding the relationship between organ-level biomechanical properties/function and their mechanical adaptation, particularly during growth. We cover a wide range of mechanobiology topics across biomaterials, cell/molecular biology, physiology, medicine, and engineering, with a particular focus on new interdisciplinary and multi-scale approaches that provide a comprehensive understanding of musculoskeletal processes during growth and adaptation, tissue modeling, and remodeling, pathogenic mechanisms, and clinical translation and mechano-medicine application of mechanobiological concepts in various musculoskeletal diseases and disorders. We welcome studies that combine computational models, animal experiments, human or clinical data, and classical and advanced imaging techniques, to gain insights into the biomechanics regulators of musculoskeletal growth.

The current Research Topic aims to feature promising and impactful research in mechanobiology, biomechanics, and related fields. Submissions of particular interest include studies that (i) employ new tools to shed light on the role of biomechanical regulators of musculoskeletal growth, (ii) unravel fundamental pathogenic mechanisms of musculoskeletal growth and adaptation across multiple scales, and (iii) offer the potential for the development of new therapeutic strategies based on age-specific mechanobiological principles. Areas to be broadly covered in this Research Topic include, but are not limited to musculoskeletal growth-related:
• Cell and Tissue mechanobiology
• Engineered biomaterials / Matrix biology
• Bioinformatics-based approaches in mechanobiology
• Mechanobiology-based therapies
• Multi-scale computational modeling
• Artificial intelligence and machine learning applications for mechanobiology
• Multi-scale experimental characterization of mechanobiological processes
• Imaging processing techniques for organ/tissue mechanoadaptation
• Mechanobiological processes
• Disease and disorder mechanisms
• Application in clinical treatments and medical devices

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

  • Brief Research Report
  • Case Report
  • Data Report
  • Editorial
  • General Commentary
  • Hypothesis and Theory
  • Methods
  • Mini Review
  • Opinion

Articles that are accepted for publication by our external editors following rigorous peer review incur a publishing fee charged to Authors, institutions, or funders.

Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

  • Brief Research Report
  • Case Report
  • Data Report
  • Editorial
  • General Commentary
  • Hypothesis and Theory
  • Methods
  • Mini Review
  • Opinion
  • Original Research
  • Perspective
  • Review
  • Systematic Review
  • Technology and Code

Keywords: bone, muscle, tendon, ligament, joint, growth, load, musculoskeletal, biomechanics, mechanoadaptation, mechanobiology, structure-fuction relationship

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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