Oral Histology - Facial Growth Fig. A photomicrograph of cartilage and its covering perichondrium.
Cartilage grows both interstitially and by surface apposition.
Near the center of the field the dense collagenous perichondrium meets the surface of the cartilage. A gradual transition of cell types from young fibroblasts to chondrocytes occurs, indicating that perichondrium cells differentiate into chondroblasts and subsequently chondrocytes, depositing matrix on the surface of the cartilage. This is the predominant mode of growth of the growth cartilage of the mandible.