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Biomechanics is the study of the structure, function and motion of the mechanical aspects of biological systems, at any level from whole to organs, cells and , and even proteinsR. McNeill Alexander (2005) Mechanics of animal movement, Current Biology Volume 15, Issue 16, 23 August 2005, Pages R616-R619. using the methods of mechanics. Biomechanics is a branch of biophysics.
An example of a gaseous biofluids problem is that of human respiration. Respiratory systems in insects have been studied for bioinspiration for designing improved microfluidic devices.
Additional aspects of biotribology include analysis of subsurface damage resulting from two surfaces coming in contact during motion, i.e. rubbing against each other, such as in the evaluation of tissue-engineered cartilage.
Comparative biomechanics overlaps with many other fields, including ecology, neurobiology, developmental biology, ethology, and paleontology. Comparative biomechanics is often applied in medicine (with regards to common model organisms such as mice and rats) as well as in biomimetics, which looks to nature for solutions to engineering problems.
Computational biomechanics is an essential ingredient in surgical simulation, which is used for surgical planning, assistance, and training. In this case, numerical (discretization) methods are used to compute, as fast as possible, a system's response to boundary conditions such as forces, heat and mass transfer, and electrical and magnetic stimuli.
Biomaterials are classified into two groups: hard and soft tissues. Mechanical deformation of hard tissues (like wood, Seashell and bone) may be analysed with the theory of linear elasticity. On the other hand, soft tissues (like skin, tendon, muscle, and cartilage) usually undergo large deformations, and thus, their analysis relies on the finite strain theory and computer simulations. The interest in continuum biomechanics is spurred by the need for realism in the development of medical simulation.
Biomechanics in sports can be stated as the body's muscular, joint, and skeletal actions while executing a given task, skill, or technique. Understanding biomechanics relating to sports skills has the greatest implications on sports performance, rehabilitation and injury prevention, and sports mastery. As noted by Doctor Michael Yessis, one could say that best athlete is the one that executes his or her skill the best.
It is well known that cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide. Vascular system in the human body is the main component that is supposed to maintain pressure and allow for blood flow and chemical exchanges. Studying the mechanical properties of these complex tissues improves the possibility of better understanding cardiovascular diseases and drastically improves personalized medicine.
Vascular tissues are inhomogeneous with a strongly non linear behaviour. Generally this study involves complex geometry with intricate load conditions and material properties. The correct description of these mechanisms is based on the study of physiology and biological interaction. Therefore, is necessary to study wall mechanics and hemodynamics with their interaction.
It is also necessary to premise that the vascular wall is a dynamic structure in continuous evolution. This evolution directly follows the chemical and mechanical environment in which the tissues are immersed like Wall Shear Stress or biochemical signaling.
With the rise of the Roman Empire, technology became more popular than philosophy and the next bio-mechanic arose. Galen (129 AD-210 AD), physician to Marcus Aurelius, wrote his famous work, On the Function of the Parts (about the human body). This would be the world's standard medical book for the next 1,400 years.
In 1543, Galen's work, On the Function of the Parts was challenged by Andreas Vesalius at the age of 29. Vesalius published his own work called, On the Structure of the Human Body. In this work, Vesalius corrected many errors made by Galen, which would not be globally accepted for many centuries. With the death of Copernicus came a new desire to understand and learn about the world around people and how it works. On his deathbed, he published his work, On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres. This work not only revolutionized science and physics, but also the development of mechanics and later bio-mechanics.
Galileo Galilei, the father of mechanics and part time biomechanic was born 21 years after the death of Copernicus. Over his years of science, Galileo made a lot of biomechanical aspects known. For example, he discovered that "animals' masses increase disproportionately to their size, and their bones must consequently also disproportionately increase in girth, adapting to loadbearing rather than mere size. The bending strength of a tubular structure such as a bone is increased relative to its weight by making it hollow and increasing its diameter. Marine animals can be larger than terrestrial animals because the water's buoyancy relieves their tissues of weight."
Galileo Galilei was interested in the strength of bones and suggested that bones are hollow because this affords maximum strength with minimum weight. He noted that animals' bone masses increased disproportionately to their size. Consequently, bones must also increase disproportionately in girth rather than mere size. This is because the bending strength of a tubular structure (such as a bone) is much more efficient relative to its weight. Mason suggests that this insight was one of the first grasps of the principles of biological optimization.
In the 17th century, Descartes suggested a philosophic system whereby all living systems, including the human body (but not the soul), are simply machines ruled by the same mechanical laws, an idea that did much to promote and sustain biomechanical study.
Borelli was the first to understand that "the levers of the musculature system magnify motion rather than force, so that muscles must produce much larger forces than those resisting the motion". Influenced by the work of Galileo, whom he personally knew, he had an intuitive understanding of static equilibrium in various joints of the human body well before Isaac Newton published the laws of motion. His work is often considered the most important in the history of bio-mechanics because he made so many new discoveries that opened the way for the future generations to continue his work and studies.
It was many years after Borelli before the field of bio-mechanics made any major leaps. After that time, more and more scientists took to learning about the human body and its functions. There are not many notable scientists from the 19th or 20th century in bio-mechanics because the field is far too vast now to attribute one thing to one person. However, the field is continuing to grow every year and continues to make advances in discovering more about the human body. Because the field became so popular, many institutions and labs have opened over the last century and people continue doing research. With the Creation of the American Society of Bio-mechanics in 1977, the field continues to grow and make many new discoveries.
In the 19th century Étienne-Jules Marey used cinematography to scientifically investigate locomotion. He opened the field of modern 'motion analysis' by being the first to correlate ground reaction forces with movement. In Germany, the brothers Ernst Heinrich Weber and Wilhelm Eduard Weber hypothesized a great deal about human gait, but it was Christian Wilhelm Braune who significantly advanced the science using recent advances in engineering mechanics. During the same period, the engineering mechanics of materials began to flourish in France and Germany under the demands of the Industrial Revolution. This led to the rebirth of bone biomechanics when the railroad engineer Karl Culmann and the anatomist Hermann von Meyer compared the stress patterns in a human femur with those in a similarly shaped crane. Inspired by this finding Julius Wolff proposed the famous Wolff's law of bone remodeling.
Biomechanics is also applied to studying human musculoskeletal systems. Such research utilizes force platforms to study human ground reaction forces and infrared videography to Motion capture the trajectories of markers attached to the human body to study human 3D motion. Research also applies electromyography to study muscle activation, investigating muscle responses to external forces and perturbations.Basmajian, J.V, & DeLuca, C.J. (1985) Muscles Alive: Their Functions Revealed, Fifth edition. Williams & Wilkins.
Biomechanics is widely used in orthopedic industry to design orthopedic implants for human joints, dental parts, external fixations and other medical purposes. Biotribology is a very important part of it. It is a study of the performance and function of biomaterials used for orthopedic implants. It plays a vital role to improve the design and produce successful biomaterials for medical and clinical purposes. One such example is in tissue engineered cartilage. The dynamic loading of joints considered as impact is discussed in detail by Emanuel Willert.
It is also tied to the field of engineering, because it often uses traditional engineering sciences to analyze biological systems. Some simple applications of Newtonian mechanics and/or materials sciences can supply correct approximations to the mechanics of many biological systems. Applied mechanics, most notably mechanical engineering disciplines such as continuum mechanics, mechanism analysis, structural analysis, kinematics and dynamics play prominent roles in the study of biomechanics. Usually biological systems are much more complex than man-built systems. Numerical methods are hence applied in almost every biomechanical study. Research is done in an iterative process of hypothesis and verification, including several steps of Conceptual model, computer simulation and Experiment.
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