Figure 4.

Biological characteristics of osteoblasts on three different bone cement surfaces. (A) Real-time qPCR analysis of mRNA expression of bone-related genes of collagen type I alpha 1 (collagen-1) and osteocalcin on the three different materials on day 7 using osteoblastic cell cultures. Relative expression levels (2^−ΔΔCt values) of the genes of interest were normalized to that of the housekeeping gene Gapdh. (B) Alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity at day 7, colorimetrically quantified and standardized relative to cell number. (C) Representative images of mineral deposition evaluated using Alizarin red staining at culture day 14 (top). The histogram of the percentage of the Alizarin-positive area relative to total cell growth area on a culture well on the same day (bottom). Each value represents the mean ± standard deviation of triplicate experiments (n = 3). * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, one-way ANOVA followed by a Bonferroni test.