Physiologic load-bearing characteristics of autografts, allografts, and polymer-based scaffolds in a critical sized segmental defect of long bone: an experimental study.

Background To address the challenge of treating critical sized intercalary defects, we hypothesized that under physiologic cyclic loading, autografts, allografts, and scaffolds loaded with and without human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) would have different biomechanical characteristics.