Evidence / Sources / E39
Nomura M et al. Disuse atrophy of articular cartilage can be restored by mechanical reloading in mice. Mol Biol Rep 2024
What it can tell you
That in mice, articular cartilage atrophies under disuse and recovers with mechanical reloading — the cleanest demonstration that unloading is itself a failure mode, not a safe default.
What it cannot
Any human dose. Animal and in-vitro mechanobiology explains why protocols load deliberately; it cannot justify a single specific prescription, and this site never lets it.
Everything on this site that leans on E39 — 9 claims
Stage IV · Strength“The graft is remodeling, not finished — repair-tissue texture is still measurably changing between 3 and 24 months on imaging. Progressive load in this window is the stimulus the t…”Stage IV · Strength [patellofemoral]“Swelling, catching, locking, or pain — and the opposite error. Cartilage atrophies under unloading in the animal models; excessive self-imposed protection is a real failure mode, n…”Stage IV · Strength [tibiofemoral]“Swelling, catching, locking, or pain — and the opposite error. Cartilage atrophies under unloading in the animal models; excessive self-imposed protection is a real failure mode, n…”Program · Stage IV (patellofemoral) · Slow down if“Swelling, catching, locking, or pain that climbs through a session — and the opposite error. Cartilage atrophies under unloading in the animal models; excessive self-imposed protec…”Program · Stage IV (tibiofemoral) · Slow down if“Swelling, catching, locking, or pain that climbs through a session — and the opposite error. Cartilage atrophies under unloading in the animal models; excessive self-imposed protec…”Program · Stage VI (patellofemoral)“Keep the impact you earned — The mechanobiology is animal evidence; it explains the habit, it does not prescribe a dose.”Program · Stage VI (tibiofemoral)“Keep the impact you earned — The mechanobiology is animal evidence; it explains the habit, it does not prescribe a dose.”Exercise Library · Holding impact capacity“Articular cartilage atrophied under disuse and recovered with mechanical reloading in animal and in-vitro models, and repair tissue after cartilage procedures was still maturing me…”Why this · Why protecting it harder than this is also a mistake“Cartilage thins under unloading, with matrix loss, and reloading restores it — so excessive self-imposed protection is a real error rather than a safe default.”
Read it like a sceptic
Murine cartilage is millimetres thin and loads differently; the direction of the effect transfers more credibly than any magnitude.
Population
Mice — a different population from MACI itself. Wherever this source appears, that flag appears with it.
Selection policy
Sources enter the registry through docs/research — the evidence table records design, population, and size for every entry, and pages cannot cite anything outside it.