Osteoarthritis (OA) is one of the most prevalent chronic joint diseases. 44 The rate of osteoarthritis is on the rise due to the ageing population and the outbreak of obesity. 2 It had been recognized that current diagnostic methods of OA are established late in the disease process and at times too late for any disease-modifying drugs to have any effect.1

Although many still-imaging procedures and biochemical marker analyses have been developed to monitor the disease, there is a lack of techniques to characterize the mechanical properties of the different layers cartilage impacted by osteoarthritis especially at an early stage.1 Moreover, a number of elastography methods are destructive. Non-destructive techniques based on ultrasound have been reported in literature, but the inherent resolution limitations makes it difficult to use for assessing the thin layers in a joint. In order to obtain a more accurate definition of OA, this thesis proposes an OCT elastography technique to quantify the progression of tissue stiffness in rat articular cartilage affected by OA.