Figure 3.

Effect of thermal denaturation of collagen on bound water fraction. Baking bone from 110°C to 140°C for 24 hours per temperature did not affect the volume fraction of bound water, while subsequently increasing the temperature to 200°C for 24 hours significantly increased bound water fraction relative to baseline (A). Boiling bone for 8 hours significantly increased bound water fraction, but the largest increase occurred after pressure‐heating the bone for 8 hours at 130°C (B). The dashed line is the median value for the baseline measurements. Rehydrating the bone samples for 24 hours kept the wet mass constant until baking at 200°C when possibly organic material was lost (C). Accompanying the small but significant increase in bound water fraction after boiling the bone samples was a small but significant increase in wet mass (D). *p < 0.05, **p < 0.005, ***p < 0.0005, and ****p < 0.0001 for temperature versus baseline from Dunn's multiple comparison test.