Saturday, February 13, 2010

Finding the proof that growing taller via microfractures is possible

Not only possible but viable as well.  Limb lengthening works but at the expense of being able to perform well athletically and at great monetary cost.

Our theory is that it is possible to grow taller via microfractures sufficient enough to denature the bone to the point where their is room for new bone to grow(and thus make the body taller) but not so large as to the point to denature the bone where it can not function as well as it once did(like limb lengthening surgery).  It's also necessary to induce these microfractures while under tensile strain(stretching the bone) as microfractures induced under tensile strain are different than other kinds of microfractures.

The following types of articles can be used to support this theory:

1) Articles that suggest that microfractures denature the bone - We found this.
2) Articles that suggest that the bone can grow wider by means other than the periosteum(the periosteum is a width specific mechanism as articular cartilage is what's present at the end of the bone) Bones can grow wider by means other than the periosteum by things like surface osteoblasts and direct secretion by osteocytes.
3) Any article that explains the physiology of how microfractures are healed.
4) The histology of microfractures. We could always use more on this as histology would let us know exactly how bone works which would be applicable to other height increase methods as well.

The following types of articles can be used to prove that the theory is viable and able to be put into practice:

1) Articles that show activities that cause microcracks in the bone and these activities are such that they can be performed in a gym environment or with no outside materials at all. Again not just any microcracks but tensile strain microcracks.  Which exercises can induce these?

Here's an article about trabecular microfracture versus cortical microfracture:

Trabecular microfracture precedes cortical shell failure in the rat caudal vertebra under cyclic overloading.

"In the current study we determine the relationship between applied cyclic compressive overloading and the resulting amount of microdamage in isolated rat tail vertebrae, a bone that has been used previously for in vivo loading experiments[compressive overloading may not be the same as tensile strain overloading but some of the principles may apply]. Rat caudal vertebrae (C7-C9, n = 22) were potted in bone cement and subjected to cyclic compressive loading from 0 to 260 N."

Netwon's are kg*m/s^2.  In vivo simply means that the experiment was performed on live rats.  Rats tend to weigh about 0.5kg.  So the compressive loading was quite a bit relative to a rat's size.

"In cancellous bone, trabecular microfracture was the primary form of microdamage observed with few microcracks. Trabecular microfracture prevalence increased with the amount of cyclic loading and occurred in nine out of 10 specimens loaded into the tertiary phase[The more you load the more likely you are to experience trabecular microfracture, although we don't know if trabecular microfracture could help with LSJL, it would probably reduce hydrostatic pressure but could allow for easier flow of bone marrow]. Only small amounts of microdamage were observed in the cortical shell of the vertebrae, demonstrating that, under axial cyclic loading, damage occurs primarily in regions of cancellous bone before overt fracture of the bone (macroscopic cracks in the cortical shell)."

Trabecular bone is synonymous with spongy bone which is not the kind of microfracture damage we want if we want to grow taller by tensile strain(it may be helpful for other means).   However, it does state that microfractures occurred in the cortical(compact) bone.


The study used axial loading but if you tilted the vertebrae on it's side for example and used compressive loading that way you be able to get tensile strain in the direction you want.  Again though it takes much more to cause sufficient strain to cause microfractures then it does to generate sufficient hydrostatic pressure.


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