Venkata Aditya Saimadhukiran Dabbiru

• At the interface between biology and physics, cell mechanics has been proven to be a sensitive tool essential to understand the functional roles of the cells. In addition, it has been employed to detect pathological conditions and understand the predominant contribution of the cytoskeleton and cell signaling in the onset of diseases. While multitude of reports are available that tried to understand the differences in cell mechanics as a response to changes in biological stimuli, very few studies tried to unveil the effects of physical parameters on cell mechanics. In this thesis, I particularly question the relevance of physical parameters, which are known to be implicated in biological phenomena, for cell mechanics.