Sport helmet design and virtual impact test by image-based finite element modeling

Head injury has been a major concern in various sports, especially in contact sports such as football and ice hockey. Helmet has been adopted as a protective device in such sports, aiming at preventing or at least alleviating head injuries. However, there exist two challenges in current helmet design and test. One is that the helmet does not fit the subject's head well; the other is that current helmet testing methods are not able to provide accurate information about intracranial pressure and stress/strain level in brain tissues during impact. To meet the challenges, an image-based finite element modeling procedure was proposed to design subject-specific helmet and to conduct virtual impact test. In the procedure, a set of medical images such as computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance image (MRI) of the subject's head was used to construct geometric shape of the helmet and to develop a helmet-head finite element model that can be used in the virtual impact test.