Mechanical Properties of Functionally Graded Porous Biomaterials for Application in Prosthesis Replacement Using Analytical and Numerical Solution

Porous biomaterials are known as one of the brand new materials which considering the specific mechanical properties such as hardness and density and enabling bone growth are considered for various applications of biological prostheses including bone replacement. It has been entrenched that porous biomaterials can be produced considering defined representative volume elements by recent developments in additive manufacturing using a 3D printer. In this research, a novel functionally graded porous material is introduced based on a new representative volume element. The theoretical solutions are developed to calculation of the mechanical properties including elastic modulus and yield stress of the orthotropic material. Furthermore, numerical modeling was performed using finite element software to validate the theoretical analysis results. The results show good agreement between the theoretical method and numerical modeling. The mechanical properties of each layer as well as the properties of the whole structure have been studied considering the three structures with different porosity. As the results show, the obtained properties of the proposed structures are suitable for the application of the bone implant. Finally, the effect of geometrical features changes of representative volume elements on the mechanical properties of the structures has been studied. The results show that these changes had a significant impact on the mechanical properties of the structure and the proper efficiency and distribution of the material properties for the considered applications can be achieved by correctly defining the geometrical features.