Two-dimensional quantitative analysis of microbeam X-ray diffraction (XRD) was performed using a transmission optical system to examine biological apatite (BAp) orientation in an isolated trabecula of a human fourth lumber vertebral body. The incident X-ray beam is 20 μm in diameter, which is small enough for the isolated trabecula despite a slight beam divergence of 0.2°. Integrated intensities of (002) and (310) are obtained separately by different incident angles and detector positions. Distribution of the preferential orientation of the BAp c-axis is finally calculated quantitatively as an integrated intensity ratio of (002)/(310) in a plane containing the trabecular direction.
Preferential alignment of the BAp c-axis was finally determined to be perfectly parallel to the fiber direction in a rod-shaped trabecula, since accurate one-dimensional alignment is different from the alignment in the femoral cortical bone as a long bone that shows the local maximum of preferential alignment perpendicular to the longitudinal bone axis. For example, the integrated intensity ratio of (002)/(310) has a maximum value of 16 along the trabecular fiber and a minimum value of 0.09 in the perpendicular direction.
Using this method, the anisotropy of BAp orientation in the trabecular bone can be quantitatively evaluated in the plane including the trabecular fiber. Thus, we successfully obtained a methodology that two-dimensionally analyzes the distribution of the BAp c-axis along all axes within a plane in a bone specimen.