Until the processes occurring at healthy cartilage
are not widely
known, it is impossible to understand which factors
have a decisive
influence on pathological changes in diseases like
osteoarthritis.
Apart from the biochemical interactions, the
mechanical behaviour
of the articular cartilage plays a decisive role.
During every joint
motion enormous loads affect the bearing surface and
normally
cause no damage on the thin layers of cartilage. In
order to evaluate
this outstanding performance, unconfined compression
and atomic
force microscopy (AFM) were utilized to gain a
detailed...