A novel posture control device to induce high-rate complex loads for spine biomechanical studies

Abstract

Modern environmental scenarios such as autonomous vehicles, aircrafts, and military vehicles position the human body in a nonstandard posture and induce multiplanar loads; however, current spine alignment methods and loading are based on sagittal and planar loads. The objective of this study is to develop a posture control device and demonstrate its ability to induce multiplanar loads to the human cadaver spinal columns. The inferior end of the device was designed to allow a full six degree-of-freedom control for positioning the specimen via a coupled x-y cross table, vertical lift platform, and triaxial rotation mechanism. The superior end of the device was designed such that the cranial fixation of the specimen could be attached to the piston of the electrohydraulic testing apparatus directly or via a rotary disc through a slider-crank mechanism. The former attachment induces complex forces and moments, while the latter induces controlled moments with minimal forces. The usability of the posture control device was demonstrated by conducting experiments with a thoracolumbar spinal column for combined forces and moments, and with a head-neck column for complex moments, and in both cases, the uniaxial travel of the piston was at a dynamic rate. The posture control device can be used to study the biomechanics of the spine under complex loads and with different postures and develop injury criteria for different field environments.