  A severe application of stress on articular cartilage can initiate a cascade
of biochemical reactions that can lead to the development of osteoarthritis. We
constructed a multiscale mathematical model of the process with three
components: cellular, chemical, and mechanical. The cellular component
describes the different chondrocyte states according to the chemicals these
cells release. The chemical component models the change in concentrations of
those chemicals. The mechanical component contains a simulation of pressure
application onto a cartilage explant and the resulting strains that initiate
the biochemical processes. The model creates a framework for incorporating
explicit mechanics, simulated by finite element analysis, into a theoretical
biology framework.
