Micro CT scanning

A high definition Micro-CT was performed using a mCT80 system (Scanco Medical, Switzerland) to analyze the fixed tibias. The scanning protocol was set at a 10 mm equidistant definition, 70 kV and 70 mA X-ray energy settings, and a voxel size of 10 mm in three-dimensional (3D) form. After reconstruction, a region of interest (i.e., 200 slices below the aspect 0.1 mm to the growth plates at the proximal tibia) was selected for further trabecular bone analysis. For the investigation of trabecular structure, we detected the volume of bone to tissue (BV/TV, %), trabecular number (Tb.N, 1/mm), trabecular separation (Tb.Sp, mm), and trabecular thickness (Tb.Th, mm) [⁵¹].