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Organization of hydroxyapatite crystals within collagen fibrils
Author(s) -
Weiner Stephen,
Traub Wolfie
Publication year - 1986
Publication title -
febs letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.593
H-Index - 257
eISSN - 1873-3468
pISSN - 0014-5793
DOI - 10.1016/0014-5793(86)80993-0
Subject(s) - fibril , collagen fibril , crystallography , transmission electron microscopy , materials science , electron micrographs , crystal (programming language) , biophysics , electron microscope , chemistry , optics , nanotechnology , biology , physics , computer science , programming language
Transmission electron micrographs of individual mineralized collagen fibrils show that hydroxyapatite crystals are located mainly within the fibrils at the level of the gap regions. The plate‐shaped crystals are observed to be more or less uniformly stacked across the fibril diameter. We therefore suggest that the crystals are primarily located in ‘grooves’ created by contiguous adjacent gaps. The proposal is consistent with the observed crystal distribution in the fibril and with their average widths, which are almost 10‐times greater than an individual gap diameter.