Parry D A, Craig A S
Nature. 1979 Nov 8;282(5735):213-5. doi: 10.1038/282213a0.
Connective tissues are composite structures containing collagen, elastin, glycosaminoglycans, minerals, water and other minor components. In all cases the collagen exists predominantly in fibrillar form. The size distribution of the fibrils does, however, vary markedly with both age and the mechanical requirements of the tissue. Little is known about the mechanism of fibril formation in vivo, although some information is now available form in vitro polymerisation studies. We have now collected new and extensive electron microscope data on the size of collagen fibrils from tendon, skin, cornea and other tissues from both fetal and immature animals. The results reported here show that the diameters of the collagen fibrils thus measured lie close to a multiple of 80 A, a result which may be simply and readily interpreted in terms of the collagen microfibril and its mode of packing.
结缔组织是一种复合结构，包含胶原蛋白、弹性蛋白、糖胺聚糖、矿物质、水以及其他微量成分。在所有情况下，胶原蛋白主要以纤维状形式存在。然而，纤维的大小分布会随年龄以及组织的力学需求而显著变化。尽管现在通过体外聚合研究已经获得了一些信息，但关于体内纤维形成的机制仍知之甚少。我们现已收集了来自胎儿和未成熟动物的肌腱、皮肤、角膜及其他组织中胶原纤维大小的新的大量电子显微镜数据。此处报告的结果表明，如此测量得到的胶原纤维直径接近80埃的倍数，这一结果可以根据胶原微纤维及其堆积方式简单且容易地进行解释。
