Mondo Knows Facts

Joints glide on a film of slippery fluid

Synovial fluid contains lubricin and hyaluronic acid that reduce friction The capsule around a freely moving joint holds a small volume of viscous fluid. Lubricin coats the cartilage surfaces, while hyaluronic acid gives the fluid its thickness. Cartilage on cartilage in a lubricated joint has a lower friction coefficient than ice sliding on ice. It sits in Mondo's human body collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.

Where this comes from

OrthoInfo AAOS

Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.

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Tags: joints, cartilage, fluid

Joints glide on a film of slippery fluid: the short answers

Where does this come from, and can I check it?
Synovial fluid contains lubricin and hyaluronic acid that reduce friction. The figure is taken from OrthoInfo AAOS, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
Is this really a human body fact?
Yes. It sits on the Human Body shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
What else can I read about it?
The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.