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Nanomedicine

AFM tackles osteoarthritis

Nature Nanotechnology volume 4, pages 144–145 (2009)Cite this article

Current diagnostic tools detect cartilage degeneration only at advanced stages, but the atomic force microscope can now detect structural changes earlier, paving the way for treatment of joint diseases.

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Figure 1: The intermediate and late stages of osteoarthritis show up as narrowing of the joint space: the arrows in the left X-ray image point to a joint space in the knee of a healthy individual, whereas the arrows in the right image point to the reduced joint space in the knee of someone with intermediate-stage osteoarthritis.

DR E. WELKERLING

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Thomas Aigner, Nicole Schmitz and Jochen Haag are in the Institute of Pathology, D-04103 Leipzig, Germany. Thomas.aigner@medizin.uni-leipzig.de,

    Thomas Aigner, Nicole Schmitz & Jochen Haag

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  1. Thomas Aigner
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  2. Nicole Schmitz
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  3. Jochen Haag
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Aigner, T., Schmitz, N. & Haag, J. AFM tackles osteoarthritis. Nature Nanotech 4, 144–145 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2009.29

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