Fig. 4. (A) Relative mineralizing surface, (B) relative mineral apposition rate and (C) relative bone formation rate in the long-term recovery experiment. The relative (right minus left) bone formation rate (rBFR/BS; C) and relative mineralizing surface (rMS/BS; A) were positively associated with the recovery period duration among the bending groups (open columns). Relative mineral apposition rate (rMAR; B) exhibited a bending effect, but no trends were apparent among the bending groups. With the exception of the 8 h sham group for relative mineralizing surface, sham bending (filled columns) elicited a response similar to that observed in the nonloaded group (filled column). For comparison among bending groups, an asterisk indicates a significant difference from the 0 h bending group and a double dagger indicates a significant difference from the 0.5 h group, based on Fisher’s protected LSD at =0.05. The significance of right (loaded) versus left (nonloaded) comparisons is indicated in Table 1. Values are means + S.E.M. For values of N, see Table 1.