Although there has been an upsurge of interest in research on women's sexual and reproductive health, most of the research has remained confined to the obstetrics and gynecology disciplines, without knowledge flow to the biomechanics community. Thus, the mechanics of the female reproductive system and the changes determined by pregnancy, age, obesity, and various medical conditions have not been thoroughly studied. In recent years, more investigators have been focusing their efforts on evaluating the mechanical properties of the reproductive organs and supportive connective tissues, but, despite the many advances, there is still a lot that remains to be done. This paper provides an overview of the research published over the past few decades on the mechanical characterization of the primary female reproductive organs and supporting connective tissues. For each organ and tissue, after a brief description of the function and structure, the testing methods and main mechanical results are presented. Constitutive equations are then reviewed for all organs/tissues together. The goal is to spark the interest of new investigators to this largely untapped but fast-evolving branch of soft tissue mechanics that will impact women's gynecologic, reproductive, and sexual health care.

Human energy harvesting for powering wearable or portable electronics has been extensively studied. We propose an electromagnetic energy harvester with a magnetic orbit (EMH-MO) for low-frequency and irregular human motion energy harvesting. A circular uniform low potential orbit is designed using the reasonable arrangement of multiple magnetic fields. Driven by irregular excitations, the moving magnet is magnetically modulated to move more regularly along the noncontact magnetic orbit, which is conducive to electromechanical energy conversion. A theoretical model is established to characterize the proposed energy harvester. Both simulations and experiments indicate that EMH-MO can work effectively under ultralow frequency (<5 Hz) weak excitation. The peak-peak open-circuit voltage is 4.3 V, and the average power is 0.33 mW under a reciprocating motion of 10 Hz and 20 mm. Besides, the EMH-MO can effectively harvest energy from walking, jogging, and running of people with different physical characteristics (chunky males, tall males, and petite females).

Acoustic energy harvesting has the potential to power small-scale electronic applications and attracts wide attention. This paper presents a two-dimensional local resonant metamaterial energy harvester. The defect in the metamaterial which can induce local resonance is utilized to enhance energy harvesting. The defect mode and key parameters of the local resonant metamaterial energy harvester which can generate the maximum voltage are determined by theoretical analysis and simulations. The experiments were conducted in a hemi-anechoic room. The output voltage and transmission spectra of the local resonant metamaterial energy harvester are basically consistent with the simulations. The experimental results show that the voltage of the local resonant metamaterial energy harvester can be enhanced 950% compared with that of the bare plate energy harvester. The maximum power density of the local resonant metamaterial energy harvester is 1.24 mW cm ⁻³ . Moreover, the maximum voltage generated by the local resonant metamaterial energy harvester is about 18 times that of the bare plate energy harvester in the outdoor experiments.