A microCT imaging protocol for reproducible and efficient quantitative morphometric analysis (QMA) of joint structures of the in situ mouse tibio-femoral joint

Abstract

Micro-computed tomography (microCT) offers a three-dimensional (3D), high-resolution technique for the visualisation and analysis of bone microstructure. Using contrast-enhanced microCT, this capability has been expanded in recent studies to include cartilage morphometry and whole joint measures, known together as quantitative morphometric analysis (QMA). However, one of the main challenges in quantitative analysis of joint images is sensitivity to joint pose and alignment, which may influence measures related to both joint space and joint biomechanics. Thus, this study proposes a novel microCT imaging protocol for reproducible and efficient QMA of in situ mouse tibio-femoral joint. This wor..