Figure 12.

The cytokine-withdrawal effects after pretreatment with the combined IL-1β and IL-17A on the morphology and growth of chondrocytes in porcine pellet culture. The pellets were pretreated by the combined cytokines (0.25 ng/mL of IL-1β in combination with 0.5 ng/mL of IL-17A) for 3 days, and then cultured for 7 and 14 days by non-cytokine treatments (Wcyts) with or without glucosamine sulfate (GS; 125 μg/mL). The untreated pellets were left as a control (Ctrl). Long-term treatments with the combined cytokines were continuously cultured until the end of experiments (LCyts). The whole pellets were stained with H&E and digitized at 5× (A) and 20× (B) magnifications. The diameters of the pellets were measured along their shortest axis on the 5× magnification images (C). Data are expressed as mean ± SD of two independent experiments. * = p < 0.05.