Some new developments in the rheology of bone¹

Issue title: New Methods in Biorheology. Proceedings of the International Symposium held in Nancy, France, 17–18 August 1983. A Satellite Symposium of the Fifth International Congress of Biorheology

Guest editors: J.F. Stoltz and E. Puchelle

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Johnson, Marvin | Katz, J. Lawrence

Affiliations: Departments of Biomedical Engineering and Physics, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, N.Y. 12181

Note: [1] Supported in part by NIDR Grant 5 T32 DE07054 and NIH Grant 1RO 1AM26534.

Abstract: Bone has been shown to be a viscoelastic material which is thermorheologically complex. This implies that multiple mechanisms determine the viscoelastic response of bone. New calculations of the contribution of fluid flow to the viscoelastic behavior of bone have been made. The calculation of the relaxation time was based on Biot’s model for the relaxation of fluid flow in porous materials while the relaxation strength was estimated from simple composite models. These models together with recent measurements of the permeability of bone predict that part of the relaxation due to fluid flow will occur at fairly high frequencies, perhaps above 10 kHz for in vitro samples. Measurements of ultrasonic wave propagation and attenuation in wet bone have been performed from 0.5 MHz to 15 MHz and the mechanical damping was measured from 100 Hz to 1 kHz with fluid viscosities ranging from 10−3 to 5 × 10−2 (MKS). However, a complete understanding of the rheological properties or bone will require additional experiments to bridge the gap between the low frequency measurements and the ultrasonic measurements.

DOI: 10.3233/BIR-1984-23S130

Journal: Biorheology, vol. 23, no. s1, pp. 169-174, 1984