Аннотация:The formation of a whole body requires the coordination of many processes at different levels oforganization of the living matter. Most modern biologists adhere to the concept of genetic determinism,according to which the features of organisms are encoded in their genes. It remains an open question how theproducts of genes create a whole body and keep it alive. In the 1970s and 1980s, several research groups inde-pendently suggested that mechanical forces and stresses can integrate parts of the body into a whole system.At the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries, it became clear that the mechanical properties of organs and tissuescan influence the implementation of information encoded in genes.