Abstract
A key point for simulation studies of medical problems related to the spine is construction of a human spine model. Therefore, we undertook construction of a three-dimensional musculoskeletal simulation model using FEM. The skeletal model was constructed from computed tomography images of a young healthy male. The muscles, discs, and ligaments are attached to the skeletal model with placement and mechanical properties defined using established data from the relevant literature.
In the future, we will use this model, along with simulations of spinal motions, to analyze the dynamics and vertebral stress distributions. The proposed musculoskeletal spine model will be useful to simulate dynamic spinal motions and to estimate stress distributions on bones of the spine.
