Abstract
The increase in volume of hypertrophic chondrocytes in the growth plate is one of the principal determinants of longitudinal bone growth in mammals. Growth rates correlate directly with the increase in cell volume, which appears to occur by water imbibition (Breur et al. 1991). However nothing is at present known about the mechanisms which cause the cell to swell as it moves from the proliferative to the hypertrophic zone. Cell swelling by water imbibition generally is due to a change in the osmotic balance which can arise from either a fall in extracellular or an increase in intracellular osmolality. The volume differential between cells from different zones is however, maintained even when the cells are isolated from the extracellular matrix, indicating that it is a rise in intracellular solute composition which causes cell swelling. We have thus measured betaine to determine if intracellular accumulation of this solute provides a significant fraction of the osmotic potential needed to draw water into the hypertrophic chondrocytes. Betaine is used by many cells to protect against osmotic stress (Burg 1995).
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