BVS was first developed by C. P. Chen and R. S. Lakes in 1989 in order to address the shortcomings of existing laboratory techniques for studying viscoelastic materials. It was later refined by M. Brodt et al. to improve the rigidity and resolution of the apparatus, which were sources of error in the original design. First used to study poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA), it has since seen applications in determining the properties of bone, capacitor dielectrics, high damping metals, and other such viscoelastic materials.