Figure 3.

Cartilage microtissues self‐organize a homogenous matrix devoid of mineralization. Histological analysis of engineered cartilage reveals robust accumulation of key cartilage ECM components in both groups, stained for using Alcian blue (sGAG) and picrosirius red (PSR) stain (collagen). Alizarin red staining revealed evidence of cartilage mineralization in tissues engineered using a single‐cell strategy. Additionally, a heterogenous tissue structure and matrix deposition is clearly seen in the single‐cell group, whereas robust microtissue fusion results in homogenous matrix deposition in the microtissue group by day 28. For both histological panels, an overview image is provided as well as zoomed sections for the core (left) and periphery (right) of the construct. A) Scale bars = 500 µm (overview) and 200 µm (zoom). B) Scale bars = 700 µm (overview) and 200 µm (zoom).