Degenerative osteoarthritis is one of the most common joint diseases, and its main pathological manifestations are joint synovitis, subchondral osteosclerosis, progressive damage to cartilage leading to osteophyte formation, and narrowing of joint spaces. A large number of studies have found a certain association between the pathogenesis of different pathological manifestations of OA, but the detailed pathogenesis is still not completely clear. Although the basic cell types of bone and cartilage tissue may all come from aquatic vertebral organisms, it has been found that osteoarthritis is mediated by epigenetic modifications of conserved developmental genes in response to excessive mechanical stress (among other factors), such as epigenetic modifications regulated by microRNAs that maintain the order of morphogenesis and temporal changes in response to stress rather than pathological phenotypes resulting from genetic mutations or new signaling pathways.

Li Xiyong, Liao Changsheng, Li Songfeng, Han Pengfei. Research progress on epigenetic modification of genes in degenerative osteoarthritis. International Journal of Frontiers in Medicine (2023), Vol. 5, Issue 7: 7-12. https://doi.org/10.25236/IJFM.2023.050702.

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