FIGURE 1.

PTHrP did not affect chondrogenesis in cocultured pellets. Pellet cultures were either formed from 2.5 × 10⁵ or 5 × 10⁵ cells from nasal chondrocytes (NC), bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells (BM-MSC), or cocultures consisting of NC and BM-MSC at a 1:3 ratio (CC). Pellets were cultured in chondrogenic media for 3 weeks without (control) or with PTHrP at 2, 20, or 200 ng/mL. After 3 weeks of culture, pellets were photographed, weighed, and analyzed. (A) Gross appearance images taken by brightfield microscopy. (B) Wet weights of pellets. (C) GAG per DNA content of pellets. (D) The Pearson bivariate correlation of interaction index (based on calculations from Acharya et al., 2012) with GAG per DNA contents. (E) The Pearson bivariate correlation of the interaction indices of control cocultured pellets with the ratio of GAG contents of monoculture (pure) of NC to GAG content of monoculture (pure) BM-MSC. Cocultured pellets with interaction indices < 1 and > 1 clustered in red and green oval shapes, respectively. Statistical significance was determined by Student t-test (six donors in total; four donors in duplicates at 250,000 cells per pellet and two donors in duplicates at 500,000 cells per pellet; n = 12; ^∗∗p < 0.01).