The Mechanical Characterization and Comparison of Male and Female Calvaria Under Four-Point Bending Impacts

Abstract

The circumstances in which we mechanically test and critically assess human calvarium tissue would find relevance under conditions encompassing real-world head impacts. These conditions include, among other variables, impact velocities, and strain rates. Compared to quasi-static loading on calvaria, there is less reporting on the impact loading of the calvaria and consequently, there are relatively fewer mechanical properties on calvaria at relevant impact loading rates available in the literature. The purpose of this work was to report on the mechanical response of 23 human calvarium specimens subjected to dynamic four-point bending impacts. Impacts were performed using a custom-built four-point impact apparatus at impact velocities of 0.86–0.89 m/s resulting in surface strain rates of 2–3/s—representative of strain rates observed in vehicle collisions and blunt impacts. The study revealed comparable effective bending moduli (11–15 GPa) to the limited work reported on the impact mechanics of calvaria in the literature, however, fracture bending stress (10–47 MPa) was relatively less. As expected, surface strains at fracture (0.21–0.25%) were less compared to studies that performed quasi-static bending. Moreover, the study revealed no significant differences in mechanical response between male and female calvaria. The findings presented in this work are relevant to many areas including validating surrogate skull fracture models in silico or laboratory during impact and optimizing protective devices used by civilians to reduce the risk of a serious head injury.