Industrial Health
Online ISSN : 1880-8026
Print ISSN : 0019-8366
ISSN-L : 0019-8366
Original Articles
High Cycle Fatigue Behaviour of Functional Spinal Units
Gerd HUBERDaniel M. SKRZYPIECAnke KLEINKlaus PÜSCHELMichael M. MORLOCK
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JOURNAL FREE ACCESS

2010 Volume 48 Issue 5 Pages 550-556

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Abstract

Vibrations have been shown to be an important risk factor for spinal pathologies. The underlying mechanisms are poorly understood and in vivo data scarce and difficult to obtain. Consequently numerical models are used to estimate spinal loading; requiring fatigue strength information, which was obtained in this study for spinal specimens from young and old male donors of working age in vitro. Bone mineral density (BMD) and endplate area were determined using CT scans. Three groups were investigated: young specimens in neutral posture, young in flexed posture, and old in neutral posture. The loading consisted of 300,000 sinusoidal compression cycles of 2 kN, inducing a nucleus pressure peek of approximately 1.4 MPa. No failure of the young specimens in neutral posture was observed, but four specimens from older donors with low BMD failed. The product between endplate area and BMD was shown to be useful to predict fatigue strength for old donors and should therefore be considered with regard to whole body vibration injuries. In flexed posture, two specimens from young donors failed. One failure can be attributed to low BMD following the trend for the old specimens; the other failure could not be explained, leaving the influence of flexion yet unclear.

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© 2010 by National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health
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