Abstract
ARTICULAR cartilage consists principally of collagen fibres embedded in a mucopolysaccharide ground substance. Electron microscopy studies1 show that the collagen fibres near the articular surface are predominantly parallel to the surface; viewed perpendicularly to the surface, they also show a dominant orientation which varies systematically over the whole joint surface. In contrast, the fibres in the deeper zones have a more random distribution with a tendency to be perpendicular to the surface. The fibre diameter and distance between adjacent fibres appear to increase with depth from the articular surface. Chemical and physico-chemical studies (unpublished results of H. Muir and A. Maroudas) confirm that the collagen density decreases with depth from the articular surface.
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References
Maroudas, A., and Bullough, P., Nature, 219, 1260 (1968); Weiss, C., Rosenberg, L., and Heltet, A. J., J. Bone Joint Surg., 50A (4), 663 (1968).
Benninghof, A., Z. Zellforsch., 2, 783 (1925).
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KEMPSON, G., FREEMAN, M. & SWANSON, S. Tensile Properties of Articular Cartilage. Nature 220, 1127–1128 (1968). https://doi.org/10.1038/2201127b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/2201127b0
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