Although bone is continually being remodeled and ultimately declines with aging, little is known whether similar changes occur in the sensory and sympathetic nerve fibers that innervate bone. Here, immunohistochemistry and confocal microscopy were used to examine changes in the sensory and sympathetic nerve fibers that innervate the young (10 days post-partum), adult (3 months) and aging (24 mo...

We have studied the characteristics of bone ingrowth of a new porous tantalum biomaterial in a simple transcortical canine model using cylindrical implants 5 x 10 mm in size. The material was 75% to 80% porous by volume and had a repeating arrangement of slender interconnecting struts which formed a regular array of dodecahedron-shaped pores. We performed histological studies on two types of ma...

Bone is a tough biological material. It is generally accepted that bone's toughness arises from its unique hierarchical structure, which in turn facilitates distributed microcracking prior to fracture. Yet, there has been limited progress on the detailed roles of the structural elements in the microcracking process. The present study examines the structure-microcracking relations at the lamella...

Bones are an integral part of the human body that exhibit piezoelectric properties, meaning that when stress is applied to the bone, the bone produces a current within itself. This is known as the piezoelectric effect. Material that are piezoelectric can similarly exhibit the reverse piezoelectric effect, meaning that when a current is applied, the material compresses on itself. This property h...

Born in 1973, this 15-year-old girl was evaluated for kidney transplantation (KTx) in May 1988. A long history of urolithiasis started at the age of 6 months. At age 11 years, she was admitted for regular haemodialysis and submitted to binephrectomy 6 months later. Microscopic examination of the kidneys showed massive calcium oxalate deposition. After 3 years on dialysis, the patient developed ...

In the last years there has been a great interest in cortical bone investigation. In fact cortical bone porosity is considered one of the main parameters which determines bone strength [3, 8]. Even if histology has been the gold standard for the morphometric examination of bone specimens, in the last ten years a new method arose: X-ray microtomography (micro-CT). It permits the non-destructive ...

Teriparatide [human parathyroid hormone (1-34)], which exerts an anabolic effect on bone, is used for the treatment of osteoporosis in patients who are at a high risk for fracture. That the once-daily administration of teriparatide causes an increase in cortical porosity in animal models and clinical studies has been a matter of concern. However, it is not well documented that the frequency of ...