AFR-FNR 17013182: Unraveling Mechano-Biological Couplings: Towards Personalized Medicine and Targeted Pressure Ulcer Prevention

Projects
Published

September 1, 2022

For years, research models studied two risk factors separately — how tissue is compressed and how blood circulates within it. My PhD work combines them in a unified porous model, developed and evaluated alongside new experiments on human patients. Think of the skin as a living sponge filled with tiny blood vessels. When pressure is applied, it’s gradually squeezed, cutting off oxygen — and when released, blood rushes back in. This new model reveals the subtle interplay between mechanical stress and biological response (ischemia and hyperemia), helping us understand when and how damage starts. This open-source work marks a significant step forward in understanding and preventing pressure ulcers — and moves us closer to truly personalized medicine. (Lavigne et al. 2023),(Lavigne et al. 2024),(Lavigne, Urcun, et al. 2025),(Lavigne, Afanador, et al. 2025)

PhD
PhD Graphical Abstract
Coupling biology in mechanics through porous modelling for Human skin.
experiment
Experiment
Laser Doppler Flowmetry to capture the microcirculatory response.
experiment
Experimental setup
Laser Doppler Flowmetry to capture the microcirculatory response.
multiscale
The skin as a sponge
Porous representation of the skin: multiscale.
model
Hierarchical Porous Model
Porous model as a brick
poro
Porous-like viewcut of the skin.
AI generated.
defense
PhD Defense
PhD Defense

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References

Lavigne, Thomas, Camilo Andrés Suarez Afanador, Anas Obeidat, and Stéphane Urcun. 2025. “Synthetic Porous Microstructures: Automatic Design, Simulation, and Permeability Analysis.” https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.14518.
Lavigne, Thomas, Stéphane Urcun, Bérengère Fromy, Audrey Josset-Lamaugarny, Alexandre Lagache, Camilo A. Suarez-Afanador, Stéphane P. A. Bordas, Pierre-Yves Rohan, and Giuseppe Sciumè. 2025. “Hierarchical Poromechanical Approach to Investigate the Impact of Mechanical Loading on Human Skin Micro-Circulation.” International Journal for Numerical Methods in Biomedical Engineering. https://doi.org/10.1002/cnm.70066.
Lavigne, Thomas, Stéphane Urcun, Emmanuelle Jacquet, Jérôme Chambert, Aflah Elouneg, Camilo A. Suarez-Afanador, Stéphane P. A. Bordas, Giuseppe Sciumè, and Pierre-Yves Rohan. 2024. “Poromechanical Modelling of the Time-Dependent Response of in Vivo Human Skin During Extension.” International Journal for Numerical Methods in Biomedical Engineering. International Journal for Numerical Methods in Biomedical Engineering. https://doi.org/10.48550/ARXIV.2412.07374.
Lavigne, Thomas, Stéphane Urcun, Pierre-Yves Rohan, Giuseppe Sciumè, Davide Baroli, and Stéphane P. A. Bordas. 2023. “Single and Bi-Compartment Poro-Elastic Model of Perfused Biological Soft Tissues: FEniCSx Implementation and Tutorial.” Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials 143 (July): 105902. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmbbm.2023.105902.