Effect of intermittent hydrostatic pressure on aging human chondrocyte cells

In this study, a hydrostatic pressure chamber (HPC) is designed and developed to host chondrocyte cell culture. External stimuli such as forces, pressure, vibration etc. are found to be significant factors on upregulating the relevant proteins for constructing the extracellular matrix (ECM) during culturing. The aim of this paper is to design a system which provides external stimuli during chondrocyte cell culture as well as to discover the relevant gene which can generate the repair and regeneration of aging cells. The system consists of a controllable HPC that provides intermittent hydrostatic pressure (HP) on the cultured cells. The chamber is capable of applying intermittent HP in the range: 0 to1 MPa, at a frequency of 0.5-1Hz. An investigation was undertaken to determine the improvement of human chondrocyte cells viz. of 3 sub-jects whose ages are 60 and above. The effect of HP on the aging cells is observed through the extracted ribonucleic acid (RNA) after the cell is treated with HP for two hours, each day, over four days. The experiments were conducted to observe the effect of HP on the level of collagen type I, collagen type II, and aggrecan. Results show that HP did little to help in upregulating the aggrecan and collagen type II in aged-chondrocyte cells. Further, it was found that the application of HP depended on the number of days applied. The results presented the possibility of ap-plying HP in regeneration of damaged cartilage in elderly.