Development of a protocol to quantify local bone adaptation over space and time: Quantification of reproducibility.

摘要: In vivo micro-computed tomography (µCT) scanning of small rodents is a powerful method for longitudinal monitoring bone adaptation. However, the life-time growth in makes it challenge to quantify local Therefore, aim this study was develop protocol, which can take into account large growth, adaptations over space and time. The entire right tibiae eight 14-week-old C57BL/6J female mice were consecutively scanned four times an µCT scanner using nominal isotropic image voxel size 10.4µm. repeated scan datasets aligned corresponding baseline (first) dataset rigid registration. 80% tibia length (starting from endpoint proximal plate) selected as volume interest partitioned 40 regions along tibial long axis (10 divisions) cross-section (4 sectors). mineral content (BMC) used adaptation calculated each region. All BMCs have precision errors (PE%CV) less than 3.5% (24 out PE%CV 2%), least significant changes (LSCs) 3.8%, 38 intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) 0.8. proposed protocol allows studies, with high reproducibility, essential requirement reduce number animals achieve necessary statistical power.