Stinnett-Donnelly Justin M, MacLean Jeffrey J, Iatridis James C
School of Engineering, College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences, Burlington, VT 05405.
J Med Device. 2007 Mar;1(1):56-61. doi: 10.1115/1.2355692.
The rat tail intervertebral disc has emerged as an important model to examine the mechanisms for mechanically induced degeneration and remodeling. Previous methods used to apply high precision axial compressive loading to a rat tail intervertebral disc in vivo either required anesthesia, or the permanent mounting of a loading device to the animal, and were not well described in the literature. Therefore, a new device to apply compressive loading to the rat tail intervertebral disc was developed and validated. The rat tail compressive loading system utilized a pneumatically driven device weighing 18 g, and was capable of delivering a 12.6 N sinusoidal or square waveform at frequencies up to 1.0 Hz. The system improved on previous methods in its modular construction, relative ease of fabrication, compatibility with existing tail model technology and overall cost effectiveness. The removable system eliminated the need for anesthesia and through a modular, cost effective, design allowed for the simultaneous loading of multiple animals. This system expanded the ability to accurately, ethically, and efficiently apply dynamic compressive loads to the rat tail intervertebral disc for extended periods of time in order to address questions related to disc mechanobiology.
大鼠尾椎间盘已成为研究机械诱导退变和重塑机制的重要模型。以往在体内对大鼠尾椎间盘施加高精度轴向压缩载荷的方法，要么需要麻醉，要么需要将加载装置永久安装在动物身上，且文献中对此描述并不充分。因此，开发并验证了一种用于对大鼠尾椎间盘施加压缩载荷的新装置。大鼠尾压缩加载系统采用了一个重18克的气动装置，能够以高达1.0赫兹的频率施加12.6牛的正弦或方波波形。该系统在模块化结构、相对易于制造、与现有尾模型技术的兼容性以及总体成本效益方面优于以往方法。该可移动系统无需麻醉，通过模块化、经济高效的设计，可同时对多只动物进行加载。该系统扩展了在长时间内准确、符合伦理且高效地对大鼠尾椎间盘施加动态压缩载荷的能力，以解决与椎间盘力学生物学相关的问题。
