Figure 3.
Aggregate moduli of engineered constructs under compression, means ± standard deviations. Low concentrations were 5,10 and 10 ng/ml for TGF-β, IGF and bFGF, respectively. High concentrations were 30,100 and 100 ng/ml for TGF-β, IGF and bFGF, respectively. The aggregate modulus of the native disc represents the center of the porcine TMJ disc, obtained in a previous study using the same testing approach.13 Every control construct at 6 weeks had no mechanical integrity, disintegrating under gentle manipulation, and were thus assigned zero values for aggregate modulus. There were no other statistically significant differences between groups, except that all constructs were significantly stiffer than the control at week 6 control (p < 0.01). The seeded constructs at week 0 refer to constructs after a seeding period of 1 week, and the “Week 6” constructs refer to 6 weeks beyond that.
