title: Horses and cows might teach us about human knees.
abstract: Our comparative study of the knees of horses and cows (paraphrased as highly evolved joggers and as domesticated couch-potatoes, respectively) demonstrates significant differences in the posterior sections of bovine and equine tibial cartilage, which are consistent with specialisation for gait. These insights were possible using a novel analytical measuring technique based on the shearing of small biopsy samples, called dynamic shear analysis. We assert that this technique could provide a powerful new tool to precisely quantify the pathology of osteoarthritis for the medical field.
authors.affiliation: Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, UK.
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Holland
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Vollrath
authors.forename: H S
authors.initials: HS
authors.lastname: Gill
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena; D002356:Cartilage / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000502:physiology*; D002417:Cattle / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D005684:Gait / Q000502:physiology*; D006736:Horses / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D006801:Humans; D007717:Knee / Q000033:anatomy & histology*; D013977:Tibia / Q000033:anatomy & histology