Wolff's law and the factor of architectonic circumstance

Abstract

It is apparent that the gross morphology of a bone is largely adapted to the composite of its functions. Remodeling and relocation are processes that serve to sustain constant morphology during continued growth, thereby providing a basis for continuous, uninterrupted function. The same factors that control growth also apparently regulate the process of relocation, since the process of growth itself simultaneously produces relocation as an integral part of its operation. Stress forces, possible bioelectric factors, differential or selective cell and tissue responses to stimuli, genetic predisposition, tissue and cell induction, and the entire functional matrix (which perhaps includes all of these) should all be regarded, at the present time at least, as potentially contributory to over-all growth control at the local level. Architectonic circumstances, which apparently can draw upon selected combinations of any of these, are structural situations that must necessarily be taken into account in any evaluation of the local control mechanism in bone. The architectonic factor itself deals primarily with the process of relocation, and it requires a specialized mode of growth that is specifically adapted to providing the continuously shifting placement of a bone's different parts as the whole bone increases in size. It is suggested that this consideration is fundamental and that it is a factor in determining the essential nature of balance between the different possible source's of control involved in normal morphogenesis.

Detailed studies of craniofacial development should now be carried out in the light of Frost's approach to biomechanical analyses. The intermediary role of such factors as the piezo-electric effect appears to be of basic significance, and continued fundamental work in this and other similar directions is needed. Further, a meaningful explanation of the local control mechanism itself is to be sought, since this will provide the only key to resolving the underlying basis for the numerous growth complexities described in preceding pages. An understanding of the actual operation of this critical mechanism is to be regarded as one of the foremost problems relating to bone growth.