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Mechanistic fracture criteria for the failure of human cortical bone

Nature Materials volume 2, pages 164–168 (2003)Cite this article

Abstract

A mechanistic understanding of fracture in human bone is critical to predicting fracture risk associated with age and disease. Despite extensive work, a mechanistic framework for describing how the microstructure affects the failure of bone is lacking. Although micromechanical models incorporating local failure criteria have been developed for metallic and ceramic materials1,2, few such models exist for biological materials. In fact, there is no proof to support the widely held belief that fracture in bone is locally strain-controlled3,4, as for example has been shown for ductile fracture in metallic materials5. In the present study, we provide such evidence through a novel series of experiments involving a double-notch-bend geometry, designed to shed light on the nature of the critical failure events in bone. We examine how the propagating crack interacts with the bone microstructure to provide some mechanistic understanding of fracture and to define how properties vary with orientation. It was found that fracture in human cortical bone is consistent with strain-controlled failure, and the influence of microstructure can be described in terms of several toughening mechanisms. We provide estimates of the relative importance of these mechanisms, such as uncracked-ligament bridging.

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Figure 1: The difference between failure criteria, the test geometry and the orientations used.
Figure 2: Scanning electron micrographs of the area near the unbroken notch for various orientations.
Figure 3: Scanning electron micrographs illustrating toughening mechanisms in bone through interactions between the crack and the microstructure interactions.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health under Grant No. P01DE09859 (for R.K.N.) and by the Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Science of the Department of Energy under Contract No. DE-Ac03-76SF00098 (for R.O.R.). The authors wish to thank Christian M. Puttlitz (University of California, San Francisco) for supplying the human bone used in this study, Jamie J. Kruzic for assistance with the compliance measurements, and John W. Hutchinson for helpful discussion.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Materials Sciences Division, and Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, 94720, California, USA

    R.K. Nalla & R.O. Ritchie

  2. Department of Preventive and Restorative Dental Sciences, University of California, San Francisco, 94143, California, USA

    J.H. Kinney

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Correspondence to R.O. Ritchie.

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Nalla, R., Kinney, J. & Ritchie, R. Mechanistic fracture criteria for the failure of human cortical bone. Nature Mater 2, 164–168 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat832

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