Experimental measurement of the displacement field on a mandible in vitro

This paper presents an attempt to obtain the displacement field produced in a human mandible during the mastication. This information is of crucial importance in the stress estimation. Rubber bands fixed on mandible bone are used to simulate muscles and tendons being the load applied at the incisive teeth and controlled by a load cell. The temporomandibular joint and ligaments are implemented through the fixation of the mandible to a mechanic rig. The global boundary conditions were defined according to the anatomic model. The in-plane ESPI (Electronic Speckle Pattern interferometry) technique [1] is used for the measurement of flue global displacement field at mandible surface. The numerical simulation of the 3D modal mandible [2], which includes the cortical and spongeous bone, is performed using a commercial finite element method code, Ansys® [3J. The figure 1 shows the experimental results with ESPI and the numerical simulation.

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