While Lisfranc injuries in the mid foot are less common than other ankle and mid foot injuries, they pose challenges in both properly identifying them and treating them. When Lisfranc injuries are ligamentous and do not include obvious fractures, they are very challenging for clinicians to identify unless weight bearing radiographs are used. The result is that 20%-40% of Lisfranc injuries are missed in the initial evaluation. Even when injuries are correctly identified the outcomes of surgical procedures remain poor. Existing literature has compared the different surgical procedures but has not had a standard approach or procedures across studies. This study uses a computational biomechanical model validated on a cadaveric study to evaluate factors that impact injury presentation and to compare the different procedures ability to stabilize the Lisfranc joint after an injury. Using SolidWorks® a rigid body kinematic model of a healthy human foot was created whereby the 3D bony anatomy, articular contacts, and soft tissue restraints guided biomechanical function under the action of external perturbations and muscle forces. The model was validated on a cadaveric study to ensure it matched the behavior of a healthy Lisfranc joint and one with a ligamentous injury. The validated model was then extended to incorporate muscle forces and different foot orientations when simulating a weight bearing radiograph. The last section of work was to compare the stability of four different surgical repairs for Lisfranc injuries. These procedures were three open reduction and internal fixation (ORIF) procedures with different hardware (screws, screws and dorsal plates, and endobuttons) and primary arthrodesis with screws. They required use of finite element analysis which was performed in Ansys Workbench. For the presentation of injuries, both muscle forces and standing with inversion or eversion could reduce the diastasis (separation) observed for weight bearing radiographs and thus confuse the diagnosis. When comparing the different surgical procedures, the ORIF with screws and primary arthrodesis with screws showed the most stable post-operative Lisfranc joint. However, the use of cannulated screws for fixation showed regions of high stress that may be susceptible to breakage. A challenge in the literature has been the use of different experimental designs and metrics when comparing two of the possible procedures for a Lisfranc injury head to head. This study has been able to benchmark four procedures using the same model and set of metrics. Since none of the existing procedures showed consistently good to excellent patient outcomes, more procedures could be proposed in the future. If this were to occur, this study offers a standard procedure for benchmarking the new procedure’s post-operative mechanical stability versus those procedures currently in use.

Though the literature contains many computational models studying RSA, very few utilize finite element analysis to study stresses in the implant and the surrounding bone. The introductions section shows that many parameters (center of rotation lateralization, center of rotation superior or inferior position, tilt of the cut glenoid surface, glenosphere shape design, glenosphere size, humeral design, notch severity, etc.) have been studied independently utilizing many different methods (finite element modeling and non-FE computational modeling). However, the introduction section also detailed the current limitations in modern modeling as well as many examples of the heights to which finite element modeling can be taken to study RSA. Using these limitations as guidelines, the goal of this project is to create a robust FE model of RSA to study the effect of lateralization on scapular notching and shoulder function. In the following chapters, the development of the model is detailed. In addition, results produced by the incrementally advanced models are shown. In Chapter 2, the initial finite element model encompassing scapular and RSA hardware geometry is described. Chapter 3 contains description of incremental changes to the model including humeral geometry and muscle element incorporation. An anatomically realistic configuration of the finite element model with increased functionality is detailed in Chapter 4. Finally, Chapter 5 discusses the assets and limitations of the current model as a platform for future research. In addition, a proposed validation protocol is presented.

Post-traumatic osteoarthritis (PTOA) is a debilitating joint disease in which cartilage degenerates following joint trauma, including intra-articular fracture or ligament rupture. Acute damage and chronically altered joint loading have both been implicated in the development of PTOA, but the precise pathway leading from injury to cartilage degeneration is not yet known. A series of computational analyses were performed to gain insight into the initiation and progression of cartilage degeneration. Finite element models of in vitro drop-tower impacts were created to evaluate the local stress and strain distributions that cartilage experiences during such experiments. These distributions were compared with confocal imaging of cell viability and histologically apparent matrix damage. Shear strain and tensile strain both appear to correlate with the non-uniform percentage of cell death seen in the impact region. In order to objectively evaluate structural damage to the cartilage matrix, an automated image processing program was written to quantify morphologic characteristics of cartilage cracks, as seen in histology slides. This algorithm was used to compare the damage caused by different rabbit models of PTOA and to investigate the progression of matrix damage over time. Osteochondral defect insults resulted in more numerous and more severe cracks than ACL transection. Interestingly, no progression of structural damage was identified between 8 weeks and 16 weeks in these rabbit PTOA models. A finite element based optimization algorithm was developed to determine cartilage material properties based on the relaxation behavior of an indentation test. This was then used to evaluate the spatial and temporal progression of cartilage degeneration after impact. Impacting cartilage with 2.18 J/cm2 through a metal impactor caused an immediate increase in permeability and decrease in modulus, both of which recover to nearly pre-impact levels within two weeks. Biologic testing suggests that the modulus changes were due to collagen fibril damage that is then repaired. Impacting with higher energy caused material softening that did not return to normal, suggesting an impact injury threshold below which cartilage had some ability to repair itself. To evaluate the effects of cartilage cracks on local stress and strain environments, finite element models of cracked cartilage were created. A physiologically-relevant, depth-dependent cartilage material model was developed and used to ensure accurate strains throughout the cartilage depth. The presence of a single crack was highly disruptive to the strain fields, but the particular shape or size of that crack had little effect. The most detrimental perturbations included two cracks within close proximity. When two cracks were within 0.5 mm of one another, the strain field between them increased in an additive fashion, suggesting a threshold for the amount of structural damage cartilage can withstand without being severely overloaded. The finite element models of cracked cartilage were also incorporated into an iterative degeneration simulation to evaluate the ability of mechanical loading to cause localized cartilage damage to spread to full-joint osteoarthritis.

This thesis presents a) a scheme for selecting the most suitable flexure hinge compliance equations, and b) a simple methodology of deriving kinetostatic models of micro-motion stages by incorporating the scheme mentioned above. There were various flexure hinge equations previously derived using different methods to predict the compliances of circular flexure hinges. However, some of the analytical/empirical compliance equations provide better accuracies than others depending on the t/R ratios of circular flexure hinges. Flexure hinge compliance equations derived previously using any particular method may not be accurate for a large range of t/R ratios. There was no proper scheme developed on how to select the most suitable and accurate hinge equation from the previously derived formulations. Therefore, the accuracies and limitations of the previously derived compliance equations of circular flexure hinges were investigated, and a scheme to guide designers for selecting the most suitable hinge equation based on the t/R ratios of circular flexure hinges is presented in this thesis. This thesis also presents the derivation of kinetostatic models of planar micromotion stages. Kinetostatic models allow the fulfillment of both the kinematics and the statics design criteria of micro-motion stages. A precise kinetostatic model of compliant micro-motion stages will benefit researchers in at least the design and optimisation phases where a good estimation of kinematics, workspace or stiffness of micro-motion stages could be realised. The kinetostatic model is also an alternative method to the finite-element approach which uses commercially available software. The modelling and meshing procedures using finite-element software could be time consuming. The kinetostatic model of micro-motion stages wasdeveloped based on the theory of the connection of serial and parallel springs. developed based on the theory of the connection of serial and parallel springs. The derivation of the kinetostatic model is simple and the model is expressed in closed-form equations. Material properties and link parameters are variables in this model. Compliances of flexure hinges are also one of the variables in the model. Therefore the most suitable flexure hinge equation can be selected based on the scheme aforementioned in order to calculate the kinetostatics of micro-motion stages accurately. Planar micro-motion stages with topologies of a four-bar linkage and a 3-RRR (revolute-revolute-revolute) structure were studied in this thesis. These micromotion stages are monolithic compliant mechanisms which consist of circular flexure hinges. Circular flexure hinges are used in most of the micro-motion stages which require high positioning accuracies. This is because circular flexure hinges provide predominantly rotational motions about one axis and they have small parasitic motions about the other axes. The 3-RRR micro-motion stage studied in this thesis has three-degrees-of-freedom (DOF). The 3-RRR stage consists of three RRR linkages and each RRR linkage has three circular flexure hinges. A Pseudo-Rigid-Body-Model (PRBM), a kinetostatic model and a two-dimensional finite-elementanalysis (FEA) model generated using ANSYS of micro-motion stages are presented and the results of these models were compared. Advantages of the kinetostatic model was highlighted through this comparison. Finally, experiments are presented to verify the accuracy of the kinetostatic model of the 3-RRR micromotion stage. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1289361 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Mechanical Engineering, 2007

This thesis explores the design of flexible pipes, buried in shallow trenches with dry sand backfill. The thesis reports the comprehensive analysis of twenty-two full-scale load tests conducted between 1989 and 1991 on pipe installations, mainly within a laboratory facility, at the University of South Australia. The pipes were highly flexible, spirally-wound, uPVC pipes, ranging in diameter from 300 to 450 mm. Guidelines were required by industry for safe cover heights for these pipes when subjected to construction traffic. The tests were designed by, and conducted under the supervision of, the author, prior to the author undertaking this thesis. As current design approaches for pipes could not anticipate the large loading settlements and hence, soil plasticity, experienced in these tests, finite element analyses were attempted. Extensive investigations of the materials in the installations were undertaken to permit finite element modelling of the buried pipe installations. In particular, a series of large strain triaxial tests were conducted on the sand backfill in the buried pipe installations, to provide an understanding of the sand behaviour in terms of critical state theory. Subsequently a constitutive model for the soil was developed. The soil model was validated before implementation in an element of finite element program, AFENA (Carter and Balaam, 1995). Single element modelling of the triaxial tests proved invaluable in obtaining material constants for the soil model. The new element was applied successfully to the analysis of a side-constrained, plate loading test on the sand. The simulation of the buried pipe tests was shown to require three-dimensional finite element analysis to approach the observed pipe-soil behaviour. Non-compliant side boundary conditions were ultimately adjudged chiefly responsible for the difficulty in matching the experimental data. The value of numerical analyses performed in tandem with physical testing was apparent, albeit in hindsight. The research has identified the prediction of vertical soil pressure above the pipe due to external loading as being the major difficulty for designers. Based on the finite element analyses of the field tests, a preliminary simple expression was developed for estimation of these pressures, which could be used with currently available design approaches to reasonably predict pipe deflections.

A public domain code "Object Oriented Finite element analysis for materials science" (OOF) has been extended to include tools for analysis of viscoelastic materials. Utility of these tools has been discussed along with possible applications in this publication. Added features in OOF include means to quantitatively analyze the spatiotemporal response of a composite polymeric material in dynamic as well as in static deformation conditions. These coupled with the existing features of OOF, in particular, the complete analysis of mechanical characteristics of materials provide a comprehensive tool for the studies of time dependent behavior of variety of materials including polymeric solid composites, polymer nanocomposites, polymer blends, block copolymers, and so on. The viscoelastic module draws its strength from the underlying OOF architecture to provide a macroscopic evaluation of mechanical properties using microstructural details. An application of this module for deformation analysis is the characterization of mechanical behavior a polymer nanocomposites. The deformation behaviour of polymer composite depends on the combined characteristic relaxation times of its constituents as well as its microstructural details. Results of analysis are expected to provide better insight into the role of microstructure as well as the role of interphase on the average mechanical / Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA)

Silicon in single crystal form has been the material of choice for the first demonstration of the MIT microengine project. However, because it has a relatively low melting temperature, silicon is not an ideal material for the intended operational environment of high temperature and stress. In addition, preliminary work indicates that single crystal silicon has a tendency to undergo localized deformation by slip band formation. Thus it is critical to obtain a better understanding of the mechanical behavior of this material at elevated temperatures in order to properly exploit its capabilities as a structural material. Creep tests in simple compression with n-type single crystal silicon, with low initial dislocation density, were conducted over a temperature range of 900 K to 1200 K and a stress range of 10 MPa to 120 MPa. The compression specimens were machined such that the multi-slip <100> or <111> orientations were coincident with the compression axis. The creep tests reveal that response can be delineated into two broad regimes: (a) in the first regime rapid dislocation multiplication is responsible for accelerating creep rates, and (b) in the second regime an increasing resistance to dislocation motion is responsible for the decelerating creep rates, as is typically observed for creep in metals. An isotropic elasto-viscoplastic constitutive model that accounts for these two mechanisms has been developed in support of the design of the high temperature turbine structure of the MIT microengine. / Singapore-MIT Alliance (SMA)

This thesis investigates stray losses in AC machines using the time-stepped finite element technique. Two aspects of this topic are involved in this thesis. The first aspect is to construct a finite element model for AC machine systems and develop an efficient numerical solution for the system equation; as the emphasis of this thesis, the second aspect is use the above model to analyze stray losses in AC machines under a variety of operation, design and manufacturing conditions. The thesis modifies the traditional 2-D finite element technique to account for the variations in electromagnetic field along the machines axis resulting from skewed structures, rotor interbar currents and ventilation ducts. Domain decomposition and parallel computation are incorporated to efficiently give a numerical solution to the system equation. The factors affecting harmonic stray losses in AC machines including pulse width modulation (PWM) supply, interbar resistance and slot shape are investigated using the above efficient analysis tool. Simulations and tests under different load conditions are carried out for an induction motor to investigate the additional harmonic stray loss caused by the PWM supply. For a large synchronous generator, simulations and tests are performed to study the effect of different amortisseur interbar resistances on the slot harmonic contents and the resulting harmonic stray loss in the amorisseur cage. As a factor influential to magnet stray loss in permanent magnet synchronous machines, various slot shape designs are assessed by simulations. An optimization based on an evolutionary strategy is implemented to find the best slot shape design with minimum machine loss. The conclusions in the thesis provide valued information to direct the future design and manufacture of efficient AC machines. / Power Engineering and Power Electronics

The present study aims to determine the optimum blank shape design for the deep drawing of arbitrary shaped cups with a uniform trimming allowance at the flange i.e. cups without ears. This earing defect is caused by planar anisotropy in the sheet and the friction between the blank and punch/die. In this research, a new method for optimum blank shape design using finite element analysis has been proposed. Explicit non-linear finite element (FE) code LSDYNA is used to simulate the deep drawing process. FE models are constructed incorporating the exact physical conditions of the process such as tooling design like die profile radius, punch corner radius, etc., material used, coefficient of friction, punch speed and blank holder force. The material used for the analysis is mild steel. A quantitative error metric called shape error is defined to measure the amount of earing and to compare the deformed shape and target shape set for each stage of the analysis. This error metric is then used to decide whether the blank needs to be modified or not. The cycle is repeated until the converged results are achieved. This iterative design process leads to optimal blank shape. In order to verify the proposed method, examples of square cup and cylindrical cup have been investigated. In every case converged results are achieved after a few iterations. So through the investigation the proposed systematic method of optimal blank design is found to be very effective in the deep drawing process and can be further applied to other stamping applications.

This article aims to design an innovative polishing method that can do polishing job to a complicated axial symmetric free surface. The main task of the system is to increase the precision of a middle size (diameter range from 50mm to 150mm) free surface with low precision (form error is larger than 10£gm, even reach few hundred £gm. By using the developed polishing system, the precision is expected to reach and order of sub-micron. It is a machining method which able to outcome a precise free surface, and also a high efficient free surface machining method compared to machining technique nowadays. At the beginning of this article, a logical thinking method will be used to set up a number of sub-targets from the task of the article. From those sub-targets, the keys of the polishing method would come out to accomplish the task. They are: 1.The machining tool is deformable and able to match up the shape of the surface of the tool to enlarge the polishing area. This will increase the efficiency of the machining method; 2.The pressure distribution between the tool and work piece is controllable to let the surface area with larger error form has larger machining rate. By accomplish the sub-targets above, a set of form error compensate strategy can be use to remove the error profile of the free surface with high efficiency. To increase the efficiency of the polishing system, the analysis of the force guide by ANSYS (a finite element analysis software) will be done to create a relation between the force applied and the pressure distribution. This will make the pressure distribution construction task easy and the efficiency of polishing will be increased. According to the machining method designed above, a prototype polishing machine will be designed, and a series of experiments will be done on the designed prototype polishing machine to test the workability of the polishing method. The outcome of the experiments shows that the machine not only has good repeatability, but also has a very high machining efficiency. Besides, the machining distribution experiment shows that the machining method has ability to remove the error distribution from the free surface. It means that is able to do precision machining job to the free surface.