Rate and age-dependent damage elasticity formulation for efficient hip fracture simulations.

Area of Science:

• Biomechanics
• Computational modeling
• Materials science

Background:

• Accurate bone failure prediction is crucial for clinical applications like osteoporosis screening and trauma assessment.
• Computational efficiency is vital for iterative applications such as patient-specific diagnosis and orthopaedic device design.
• Previous work established a methodology for efficient mesoscale structural bone models.

Purpose of the Study:

• To implement a damage elasticity formulation for bone, incorporating elasto-plasticity with age and strain rate dependencies.
• To integrate this material model with existing efficient structural bone models.
• To assess the model's capability in predicting femoral fractures under various loading conditions.

Main Methods:

• Development and implementation of a novel damage elasticity formulation for bone material.
• Integration of the formulation into pre-existing efficient mesoscale structural bone models.
• Simulation of femoral fractures under longitudinal compression and side fall scenarios.

Main Results:

• The implemented material model accurately predicted failure loads and fracture patterns, aligning well with experimental data.
• The influence of strain rate on failure load was observed and found consistent with existing literature.
• The damage elasticity formulation demonstrated superiority over elasto-brittle models in capturing post-onset fracture development.

Conclusions:

• The computationally efficient damage elasticity formulation effectively captures bone fracture development.
• This model is suitable for patient-specific diagnosis and orthopaedic device design, enhancing clinical applications.
• The model's accuracy and efficiency support its use in predicting bone failure across diverse clinical scenarios.