General quantitative agreement was found between our method and histology in validation experiments. Qualitative results for cartilage suggest a complicated 3-D structure that warrants further study. There is potential to develop this approach into a tool that can provide depth-resolved information on collagen orientation in near real-time, non-destructively and in vivo.

We report results to verify a theoretical framework to analyze the 3D depth-wise structural organization of collagen fibers in articular cartilage using polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography. Apparent birefringence data obtained from multi-angle measurements using a time domain polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography system has been compared with simulated data based on the extended Jones matrix calculus. Experimental data has been shown to agree with the lamellar model previously proposed for the cartilage microstructure based on scanning electron microscopy data. This tool could have potential application in mapping the collagen structural orientation information of cartilage non-invasively during arthroscopy.

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General systems definitions are often too vague or too prescriptively narrow for consistent, meaningful application by researchers across disciplines. The lack of a common, functional system definition has tended to fragment systems research and slow the advancement and general applicability of general systems theory (GST) development. This paper submits a general system definition based on a functional technique for dataflow diagramming (DFD) used in computer system analysis. This DFD-based definition illustrates added coherence and utility for deriving many kinds of systems at different research levels, and urges wider adoption and trial of the definition and modelling technique as a basis for systems research and GST theory testing.

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