Cartilage is a kind of connective tissue that buffers pressure and is essential to protect joint movement. It is difficult to self-recover once cartilage is damaged due to the lack of blood vessels, lymph, and nerve tissues. Repair of cartilage injury is mainly achieved by stimulating chondrocyte proliferation and extracellular matrix (ECM) synthesis. Cartilage homeostasis involves the regulation of multiple growth factors and the transduction of cellular signals. It is a very complicated process that has not been elucidated in detail. In this review, we summarized a variety of signaling molecules related to chondrocytes function. Especially, we described the correlation between chondrocyte-specific regulatory factors and cell signaling molecules. It has potential significance for guiding the treatment of cartilage injury.

Mg has been considered a promising biomaterial for bone implants. However, the poor corrosion resistance has become its main undesirable property. In this study, both alloying Mn and laser-melting were applied to enhance the Mg corrosion resistance. The corrosion resistance, mechanical properties, and microstructure of rapid laser-melted Mg-xMn (x = 0–3 wt %) alloys were investigated. The alloys were composed of dendrite grains, and the grains size decreased with increasing Mn. Moreover, Mn could dissolve and induce the crystal lattice distortion of the Mg matrix during the solidification process. Mn ranging from 0–2 wt % dissolved completely due to rapid laser solidification. As Mn contents further increased up to 3 wt %, a small amount of Mn was left undissolved. The compressive strength of Mg-Mn alloys increased first (up to 2 wt %) and then decreased with increasing Mn, while the hardness increased continuously. The refinement of grains and the increase in corrosion potential both made contributions to the enhancement of Mg corrosion resistance.

Mg-Zn alloys have attracted great attention as implant biomaterials due to their biodegradability and biomechanical compatibility. However, their clinical application was limited due to the too rapid degradation. In the study, hydroxyapatite (HA) was incorporated into Mg-Zn alloy via selective laser melting. Results showed that the degradation rate slowed down due to the decrease of grain size and the formation of protective layer of bone-like apatite. Moreover, the grain size continually decreased with increasing HA content, which was attributed to the heterogeneous nucleation and increased number of nucleation particles in the process of solidification. At the same time, the amount of bone-like apatite increased because HA could provide favorable areas for apatite nucleation. Besides, HA also enhanced the hardness due to the fine grain strengthening and second phase strengthening. However, some pores occurred owing to the agglomerate of HA when its content was excessive, which decreased the biodegradation resistance. These results demonstrated that the Mg-Zn/HA composites were potential implant biomaterials.

The too fast degradation of magnesium (Mg) alloys is a major impediment hindering their orthopedic application, despite their superior mechanical properties and favorable biocompatibility. In this study, the degradation resistance of AZ61 (Al 6 wt. %, Zn 1 wt. %, remaining Mg) was enhanced by rapid solidification via selective laser melting (SLM). The results indicated that an increase of the laser power was beneficial for enhancing degradation resistance and microhardness due to the increase of relative density and formation of uniformed equiaxed grains. However, too high a laser power led to the increase of mass loss and decrease of microhardness due to coarsened equiaxed grains and a reduced solid solution of Al in the Mg matrix. In addition, immersion tests showed that the apatite increased with the increase of immersion time, which indicated that SLMed AZ61 possessed good bioactivity.

The seeds of Strychnos nux-vomica L., as a traditional Chinese medicine, have good anti-inflammatory and analgesic activities. However, it usually leads to gastrointestinal irritation and systemic toxicity via oral administration. In the study, it was discovered that a novel gel transdermal delivery system contained brucine, the main effective component extracted from Strychnos nux-vomica. Results showed that the brucine gel system inhibited arthritis symptoms and the proliferation of the synoviocytes in the rat adjuvant arthritis model, which indicated its curative effect for rheumatoid arthritis. Meanwhile, it significantly relieved the xylene-induced ear edema in the mouse ear swelling test, which manifested its anti-inflammatory property. Moreover, the brucine gel eased the pain of paw formalin injection in the formalin test, which demonstrated its analgesic effects. In addition, the brucine significantly inhibited lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced Prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) production without affecting the viability of cell in vitro anti-inflammatory test, which proved that its anti-inflammatory and analgesic actions were related to inhibition of prostaglandin synthesis. It is suggested that the brucine gel is a promising vehicle for transdermal delivery on the treatment of inflammatory disease.

The poor bioactivity and mechanical properties have restricted its biomedical application, although poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyvalerate) (PHBV) had good biocompatibility and biodegradability. In this study, calcium silicate (CS) was incorporated into PHBV for improving its bioactivity and mechanical properties, and the porous PHBV/CS composite scaffolds were fabricated via selective laser sintering (SLS). Simulated body fluid (SBF) immersion tests indicated the composite scaffolds had good apatite-forming ability, which could be mainly attributed to the electrostatic attraction of negatively charged silanol groups derived from CS degradation to positively charged calcium ions in SBF. Moreover, the compressive properties of the composite scaffolds increased at first, and then decreased with increasing the CS content, which was ascribed to the fact that CS of a proper content could homogeneously disperse in PHBV matrix, while excessive CS would form continuous phase. The compressive strength and modulus of composite scaffolds with optimal CS content of 10 wt % were 3.55 MPa and 36.54 MPa, respectively, which were increased by 41.43% and 28.61%, respectively, as compared with PHBV scaffolds. Additionally, 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) assay indicated MG63 cells had a higher proliferation rate on PHBV/CS composite scaffolds than that on PHBV. Alkaline phosphatase (ALP) staining assay demonstrated the incorporation of CS significantly promoted osteogenic differentiation of MG63 cells on the scaffolds. These results suggest that the PHBV/CS composite scaffolds have the potential in serving as a substitute in bone tissue engineering.