Impact of the Loading Conditions and the Building Directions on the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical ß-Titanium Alloy Produced In Situ by Laser-Based Powder Bed Fusion.

In order to simulate micromachining of Ti-Nb medical devices produced in situ by selective laser melting, it is necessary to use constitutive models that allow one to reproduce accurately the material behavior under extreme loading conditions. The identification of these models is often performed using experimental tension or compression data. In this work, compression tests are conducted to investigate the impact of the loading conditions and the laser-based powder bed fusion (LB-PBF) building directions on the mechanical behavior of ß-Ti42Nb alloy. Compression tests are performed under two strain rates (1 s-1 and 10 s-1) and four temperatures (298 K, 673 K, 873 K and 1073 K). Two LB-PBF building directions are used for manufacturing the compression specimens. Therefore, different metallographic analyses (i.e., optical microscopy (OM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy-dispersive X-ray (EDX), electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) and X-ray diffraction) have been carried out on the deformed specimens to gain insight into the impact of the loading conditions on microstucture alterations. According to the results, whatever the loading conditions are, specimens manufactured with a building direction of 45∘ exhibit higher flow stress than those produced with a building direction of 90∘, highlighting the anisotropy of the as-LB-PBFed alloy. Additionally, the deformed alloy exhibits at room temperature a yielding strength of 1180 ± 40 MPa and a micro-hardness of 310 ± 7 HV0.1. Experimental observations demonstrated two strain localization modes: a highly deformed region corresponding to the localization of the plastic deformation in the central region of specimens and perpendicular to the compression direction and an adiabatic shear band oriented with an angle of ±45 with respect to same direction.

An analytical modeling with experimental validation of bone temperature rise in drilling process.

Predicting the bone thermal response in a surgical operation remains a major challenge. In the previous works, metal machining theory has frequently been used to predict bone temperature in drilling process. However, several experimental studies demonstrate that the chip formation process is very complex compared to metal cutting. In the present study, a simplified analytical model based on the moving heat source approach combined with the method of image sources is developed. The heat source due to the drill-bit tip was supposed to be proportional to the cutting energy. The friction at the tool-hole contact was also considered. An experimental study was performed on fresh femur pig bone for cutting speeds from 2 to 20 m/min. Temperature rise, drilling forces and bone volume fraction were measured. The experimental validation showed that the model reproduces satisfactorily the increase in temperature up to the maximum value while it overestimates the temperature during the cooling stage. A parametric study (thermal boundary conditions, lateral friction) was also performed. From the predicted results, it appears that the model can be improved by considering the effects of the bone volume fraction which can present a significant variation in the bone sample.

Morphological validation of a novel bi-material 3D-printed model of temporal bone for middle ear surgery education.

BACKGROUND: A new model of 3D-printed temporal bone with an innovative distinction between soft and hard tissues is described and presented in the present study. An original method is reported to quantify the model's ability to reproduce the complex anatomy of this region. METHODS: A CT-scan of temporal bone was segmented and prepared to obtain 3D files adapted to multi-material printing technique. A final product was obtained with two different resins differentiating hard from soft tissues. The reliability of the anatomy was evaluated by comparing the original CT-scan and the pre-processed files sent to the printer in a first step, and by quantifying the printing technique in a second step. Firstly, we evaluated the segmentation and mesh correction steps by segmenting each anatomical region in the CT-scan by two different other operators without mesh corrections, and by computing distances between the obtained geometries and the pre-processed ones. Secondly, we evaluated the printing technique by comparing the printed geometry imaged using µCT with the pre-processed one. RESULTS: The evaluation of the segmentation and mesh correction steps revealed that the distance between both geometries was globally less that one millimeter for each anatomical region and close to zero for regions such as temporal bone, semicircular canals or facial nerve. The evaluation of the printing technique revealed mismatches of 0.045±0.424 mm for soft and -0.093±0.240 mm for hard tissues between the initial prepared geometry and the actual printed model. CONCLUSIONS: While other reported models for temporal bone are simpler and have only been validated subjectively, we objectively demonstrated in the present study that our novel artificial bi-material temporal bone is consistent with the anatomy and thus could be considered into ENT surgical education programs. The methodology used in this study is quantitative, inspired by engineer sciences, making it the first of its kind. The validity of the manufacturing process has also been verified and could, therefore, be extended to other specialties, emphasizing the importance of cross-disciplinary collaborations concerning new technologies.