On the efficiency of attachment methods of biological soft tissues in shear experiments

Sandpaper and glue are commonly used to prevent slip of the sample in rheometric measurements of soft biological tissues. We show in this paper that the best attachment method is to glue the sample to the plates of the test device. Whereas no significant difference was observed at small strain, sandpaper proved to be less efficient than glue in preventing slip at large strain, leading to a significant underestimation of the tissue stiffness.