Fatigue damage in cancellous bone: an experimental approach from continuum to micro scale

  • Repeated loadings may cause fatigue fractures in bony structures. Even if these failure types are known, data for trabecular bone exposed to cyclic loading are still insufficient as the majority of fatigue analyses on bone concentrate on cortical structures. Despite its highly anisotropic and inhomogeneous structure, trabecular bone is treated with continuum approaches in fatigue analyses. The underlying deformation and damage mechanism within trabecular specimens are not yet sufficiently investigated. In the present study different types of trabecular bone were loaded in monotonic and cyclic compression. In addition to the measurement of integral specimen deformations, optical deformation analysis was employed in order to obtain strain distributions at different scale levels, from the specimens' surface to the trabeculae level. These measurements allowed for the possibility of linking the macroscopic and microscopic mechanical behaviour of cancellous bone. Deformations were found to be highly inhomogeneous across the specimen. Furthermore strains were found to already localise at very low load levels and after few load cycles. Microcracks in individual trabeculae were induced in the very early stage of cyclic testing. The results provide evidence of the capability of the method to supply essential data on the failure behaviour of individual trabeculae in future studies.

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Metadaten
Author:Sebastian DendorferORCiD, Hans Jürgen Maier, Josef Hammer
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jmbbm.2008.03.003
Parent Title (English):Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials
Document Type:Article
Language:English
Year of first Publication:2009
Release Date:2020/05/12
Tag:Mechanical behaviour
Cancellous bone; Damage; Deformation behaviour; Fatigue; Measurement and testing
GND Keyword:Knochen; Spongiosa; Ermüdungsbruch
Volume:2
Issue:1
First Page:113
Last Page:119
Konferenzangabe:Second International Conference on Mechanics of Biomaterials & Tissue, Lihue, Hawaii, 2007
Institutes:Fakultät Maschinenbau
Fakultät Maschinenbau / Labor Biomechanik (LBM)
Begutachtungsstatus:peer-reviewed
Publication:Externe Publikationen
research focus:Lebenswissenschaften und Ethik