Biophysical methods to characterize cardiovascular tissues

The main constitutive macromolecules of cardio-vascular tissues, essential to the cohesion and resiliency, are also active components which evolve with the physiology and pathology. Their functionality is connected to their internal dynamics over various scales of time and length, in close correlation with water. Vibrational, thermal and dielectric techniques, which have showed their ability to characterize synthetic polymers, deserve to be adapted to the study of proteins and biological tissues. Through some examples, we will show how these techniques are concretely used to answer cardio-vascular problematics.