Determination of Fracture Properties of Cortical Bone using Arc-Shaped Specimen

Regarding the application of testing and analysis of bone fractures in both medical and engineering fields, finding proper specimens for measuring fracture properties is important. In this study, the experimental and numerical fracture analyses of bovine cortical bone were performed for 4 anatomical regions using arc-shaped specimens. The tensile fracture tests for arc-shaped specimens were performed at ambient temperature. In practice, the stress intensity factor was calculated using standard analytical formula for arc-shaped specimens and also the related finite element (FE) models. In order to validate the FE models, the stress and strain analyses results were compared with the results obtained from digital image correlation (DIC) method. The very good agreement between these results was indicative of the accuracy of FE analyses. There were also good correlations between the initiation and propagation of crack from both experimental and FE results and the measured fracture toughness values were in good agreement with those reported in the literature. The results of this study showed that the analytical stress intensity expressions can give accurate results for the arc-shaped specimens excised from posterior and anterior regions. However, for the medial and lateral regions only the FE models can provide the required accuracy.