Mapping the 3D orientation of nanocrystals and nanostructures in human bone: Indications of novel structural features
Open Access
- 12 June 2020
- journal article
- research article
- Published by American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Science Advances
- Vol. 6 (24), eaba4171
- https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aba4171
Abstract
Bone is built from collagen fibrils and biomineral nanoparticles. In humans, they are organized in lamellar twisting patterns on the microscale. It has been a central tenet that the biomineral nanoparticles are co-aligned with the bone nanostructure. Here, we reconstruct the three-dimensional orientation in human lamellar bone of both the nanoscale features and the biomineral crystal lattice from small-angle x-ray scattering and wide-angle x-ray scattering, respectively. While most of the investigated regions show well-aligned nanostructure and crystal structure, consistent with current bone models, we report a localized difference in orientation distribution between the nanostructure and the biomineral crystals in specific bands. Our results show a robust and systematic, but localized, variation in the alignment of the two signals, which can be interpreted as either an additional mineral fraction in bone, a preferentially aligned extrafibrillar fraction, or the result of transverse stacking of mineral particles over several fibrils.Keywords
Funding Information
- Villum Fonden (17553)
- Swiss National Science Foundation (200021_178788)
- Danish Agency for Science, Technology and Innovation (DanScatt)
- Independent Research Fund Denmark | Natural Sciences (8021-00237B)
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