Morphometry of articular cartilage: a stereological method using light microscopy.

A stereological method is introduced for studying the light microscopic morphometry of articular cartilage. New parameters are presented for defining the three-dimensional structure of the articular cartilage. These include volume density of the lacunae and nuclei, numerical density of cells in 3-dimensional space, total number of cells, total volume of the lacunae in cartilage, volume and diameter of the lacuna and nucleus, the nucleus/lacuna volume ratio, and the mean volume of the matrix per cell. Using the lateral tibial condyle of the knee joint of eight rabbits, we investigated tissue preparation, sampling, morphometry, and the conditions necessary for validity and precision of the estimators. The method proved easy to use, and the estimators were precise.