Researchers have identified the importance of specialised blood vessels, in the bones of mice, that could provide a new understanding of bone deterioration during ageing.

To maintain strength and repair injuries, bones are constantly ‘remodeling’, during a lifetime, through specialised cells that remove mature bone tissue (osteoclasts) and replace it with new tissue (osteoblasts) – a process that is aided by specialised blood vessels, specifically, capillaries.

The research – led by EARA member the Max Planck Institute (MPI) for Molecular Biomedicine, Germany, and also involving EARA members the Karolinska Institute and Uppsala University, both Sweden, and Stanford University, California, USA – used non-invasive techniques to analyse the tibia and femur bones in the legs of mice, and identified a previously unknown capillary, designated type R.

The study found that these capillaries play a vital role in bone remodelling during adulthood as well as when the body ages, by ‘communicating’ with the osteoclasts and osteoblasts.

In addition, the team saw that type R capillaries provide oxygen in low-oxygen environments, allowing bone tissue to survive and function properly.

When this does not happen, it can result in bone diseases such as osteoporosis, and so the finding may shed light on strategies for treatment, as well as for tackling bone deterioration during ageing.