tantalum composites produced by attaching the periosteum to the tantalum with the cambium layer facing away from the porous tantalum and stimulated with tgf u03b21 group i of fig7 n 5 the mechanical properties of the composites were compared to normal osteochondral plugs normal controls obtained from 2 two month old rabbits from a condylar area of the knee n 3 indentation testing was performed using a method similar to that described at duda et al u201c mechanical quality of tissue engineered cartilage results after 6 and 12 weeks in vivo u201d j biomed mater res 53 673 7 2000 the specimen was placed unconstrained on a flat dish with the cartilage surface perpendicular to the 1 6 mm cylindrical indenter loading was applied at a rate of 5n minute to a maximum force of 5n maximum applied stress 2 5 mpa a dynamic mechanical analyzer ta instruments new castle del was used to apply the loading see fig1 the 5n load limit compressed the cartilage beyond the toe region of the stress strain curve since the bone tantalum is much stiffer than the cartilage all deformation was assumed to be occurring in the cartilage during testing the specimens were immersed in saline applied stress was calculated by dividing the applied force by the area of the indenter strain was defined as the indentation displacement divided by the original cartilage thickness elastic modulus was calculated as the slope of the linear region of the stress strain curve between 0 and 0 5 mpa applied stress and less than 20 strain data are analyzed by two way analysis of variance anova significant main effects are further analyzed using post hoc testing such as the student newman keuls procedure we evaluated the feasibility of developing a biologic and prosthetic implant.