Fig. 8.

Histological evaluation at different time points after material implantation. HE and Masson staining of a decalcified femoral condyle harvested four weeks after surgery (A). The defects formed after bone cement removal are the holes centred in the sections. The red square indicates the trabecular bone adjacent to the bone cement, and the blue-stained area indicates the synthesized collagen matrix. VG staining of the undecalcified femoral condyle harvested 16 weeks after surgery was performed to observe the bone-cement contact (B). A linear area of light transmission was detected at the bone-cement interface in the PBC group (white arrow); the letter “M” indicates the implanted material, and the symbol “∗” indicates bone tissue, which was stained red. (n ​= ​3. The scale bar of decalcified samples is 0.5 cm. The scale bar of images of HE and Masson's trichrome staining is 1 ​mm at 1 ​× ​magnification (left) and 200 ​μm ​at 5 ​× ​magnification (right); the scale bar of images of VG staining is 50 ​μm ​at 5 ​× ​magnification and 100 ​μm ​at 10 ​× ​magnification). (For interpretation of the references to color in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the Web version of this article.)