Radial organization of interstitial exchange pathway and influence of collagen in synovium

The synovial intercellular space is the path by which water, nutrients, cytokines, and macromolecules enter and leave the joint cavity. In this study two structural factors influencing synovial permeability were quantified by morphometry (Delesse's principle) of synovial electronmicrographs (rabbit knee), namely interstitial volume fraction Vv.1 and the fraction of the interstitium obstructed by collagen fibrils. Mean Vv.1 across the full thickness was 0.66 +/- 0.03 SEM (n = 11); but Vv.1 actually varied systematically with depth normal to the surface, increasing nonlinearly from 0.40 +/- 0.04 (n = 5 joints) near the free surface to 0.92 +/- 0.02 near the subsynovial interface. Tending to offset this increase in transport space, however, the space "blocked" by collagen fibrils also increased nonlinearly with depth. Bundles of collagen fibrils occupied 13.6 +/- 2.4% of interstitial volume close to the free surface but 49 +/- 4.8% near the subsynovial surface (full-thickness average, 40.5 +/- 3.5%), with fibrils accounting for 48.6-57.1% of the bundle space. Because of the two counteracting compositional gradients, the space available for fibril-excluded transport (hydraulic flow and macromolecular diffusion) was relatively constant > 4 microns below the surface but constricted at the synovium-cavity interface. The space available to extracellular polymers was only 51-53% of tissue volume, raising their effective concentration and hence the lining's resistance to flow and ability to confine the synovial fluid.