Simulation-Based Stress Analysis for a 3D Modeled

Humerus-Prosthesis Assembly
1

S. Herle1, C. Marcu1, H. Benea2, L. Miclea1, R. Robotin1

Department of Automation, Technical University of Cluj-Napoca, Romania

C. Daicoviciu 15, 400020 Cluj-Napoca, Romania
{Sorin.Herle, Cosmin.Marcu, Liviu.Miclea, Radu.Robotin}@aut.utcluj.ro
2
Iuliu Hatieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Romania,
V.Babes 8, 400012 Cluj-Napoca, Romania
beneahorea@yahoo.com

Abstract- The development of mechanical models of the humerus-prosthesis assembly represent a solution for analyzing the
behavior of prosthesis devices under different conditions; some of
these behaviors are impossible to reproduce in vivo due to the
irreversible phenomenon that can occur. This paper presents a
versatile model of the humerus-prosthesis assembly. The model is
used for stress analysis and displacement distributions under different configurations that correspond to possible in vivo implementations later on. A 3D scanner was used to obtain the virtual
model of the humerus bone. The endoprosthesis was designed
using 3D modeling software and the humerus-prosthesis assembly
was analyzed using Finite Element Analysis software.

I. INTRODUCTION
The development of a durable endoprosthesis with a good
rate of integration represents a major goal for both physicians
and bioengineers.
The prosthesis devices used today have problems related to
the osseointegration, especially in the long term. The possible
complications that may occur are related to pathological, surgical or design factors [1],[2],[3]. Bone is a living tissue,
which continuously rebuilds its structure according to the direction of the loads exerted on it. The insertion of a metal prosthesis into the medullar canal will disturb the load equilibrium
in the bone. If a reduced load is encountered at the interface of
the bone with the prosthetic device (which means that the prosthetic device is not well fixed) this will cause atrophy of the
bone, and in time the loss of the prosthesis. A lack in osseointegration can also be related to an increased stress at the contact surface of the prosthetic device with the bone. This increased stress will reduce the capacity of the bone to grow and
to integrate the prosthesis.
Because endoprostheses are affected by these mechanical
factors, together with other, chemical and thermal factors, suitable materials are required to achieve biocompatibility and
durability. Titanium alloy and cobalt alloy are the most often
used materials for these prostheses. Even if these materials are
biocompatible, there still remains the problem of interfacing
the endoprosthesis and the bone in order to increase the osseointegration and to reduce the rate of failure. To solve this
problem, materials like hydroxyapatite, chitosan and collagen
fibers are used at the interface of the bone with the prosthetic
device.

To find the best solution for prosthesis development, it is

important to use noninvasive methods. Therefore mathematical
models of prostheses are developed and used to analyze behaviors under different conditions (applied forces, materials used
for prosthesis and coating materials for osseointegration). The
most often used computer based method is finite element analysis.
In this paper we focus on the analysis of behaviors of the
healthy humeral bone and the humeral bone with an endoprosthesis. The force and stress distribution into the boneprosthesis assembly will be analyzed when the prosthesis is
made of titanium alloy and cobalt alloy, respectively. The
analysis will be performed in the absence, as well as in the
presence of interfacing materials (hydroxyapatite and collagen
fibers) that coat the prosthesis.
II. MODELING THE HUMERAL ENDOPROSTHESIS
Analysis of forces and stress distribution along the healthy
humerus and humerus-prosthesis assembly in vitro requires
models of humerus and humeral endoprosthesis.
A. Humerus 3D model
It is known that the bone is a non-isotropic material. However,
to simplify the modeling, we consider the bone as an isotropic
material. If e.g., the humerus model is obtained using 3D scanning and digital reconstruction, then the model can be considered
very close to the natural bone. Using the finite element method, a
series of analyses can be made such as deformations, elastic
strain and stress when an external force is applied to the bone.
Due to the complex form of the bone, its model is almost
impossible to design using 3D design software. Therefore, we
used a 3D scanner and reconstructed the bone model from
cross sections of the bone. The scanner model is 3D Kreon
Zephyr KZ 50 capable to identify 30000 points per second with
a vertical resolution of 5 m. The initial result from the scanner
was a cloud of points which has been processed and prepared
for the next operation. The next operation consisted in building
the mesh using a triangulation method having as input the
cloud of points from the previous operation. Then as a last operation the bone surfaces were built based on the previous
mesh.

343

T. Sobh, K. Elleithy (eds.), Innovations in Computing Sciences and Software Engineering,

DOI 10.1007/978-90-481-9112-3_58, Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010

344

HERLE ET AL.

(a)
(b)
(c)
Figure 1. Steps in 3D bone reconstruction: (a) real bone, (b) the mesh,
(c) 3D model of the bone

Fig. 1 presents the real bone, the mesh from cloud of points
and the final 3D model used in analyses.
B. Modeling the humeral endoprosthesis
The design of the humerus prosthesis implies some constrains regarding its shape and material.
From the material point of view, in case of an endoprosthesis
the most often used materials are cobalt-chrome alloys and
titanium-aluminum- vanadium (Ti6Al4V) alloy.
Due to the patient-to-patient variation of the humerus bone,
the humerus endoprostheses must be personalized in shape and
dimensions.
In the design stage we considered a prosthesis made by Solar
company [4] starting from the premise that the study presented
in this paper wants to show the design and implementation of
some virtual models which can be used in analysis of the mechanical behavior of the humerus-prosthesis assembly. The
shape and dimensions used for the particular case of the designed model are presented in Fig. 2. Fig. 3 illustrates different
views of the prosthesis model used later for the analysis.

Figure 3. Different views of the SolidWorks endoprosthesis model

The endoprosthesis model has two components forming an

assembly: the prosthesis head and the prosthesis tail.
C. Creating the humerus-prosthesis assembly model
To build the humerus-prosthesis assembly, the humerus
model has been cut in order to respect the external surface of
the prosthesis. We established coincidence and concentricity
links between contact surfaces in order to obtain a correct analysis when imported in the Ansys software.
Considering the X-Ray photograph presented in Fig. 4a
which illustrates the placing mode of the prosthesis in the humerus, we realized the humerus-prosthesis assembly presented
in Fig. 4b.
During surgery, the humerus is processed in order to fix the
endoprosthesis. The humeral head is cut and the humerus
bone is prepared by manually milling the fixing channels. In
our case, the 3D model of the humerus was processed in order
to obtain the correct assembly with the modeled endoprosthesis.

(a)

(b)

Figure 4. (a) X-Ray picture of the prosthesis fixed into the humerus,
(b) Humerus-Prosthesis assembly
Figure 2. SolidWorks model of the prosthesis

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SIMULATION-BASED STRESS ANALYSIS

III. ANALYSIS OF MECHANICAL

PROPERTIES

One method widely used to analyze the mechanical properties analyses of a material is finite element analysis. The
drawback of this method is the computational load due to
the large number of equations that must be solved. The solving time of the analysis depends on the model complexity
and on the computer performance. For all the analyses made
we considered that the humerus and the prosthesis are isotropic and elastic materials. The properties of materials used
for analyses were: Young Modulus, Poissons Ratio, Density, Tensile Yield Strength, Compression Yield Strength,
Ultimate Yield Strength, Thermal expansion, Thermal conductivity and Specific heat. Table 1 presents the values of
these properties for different materials used in simulations
and analyses [6-11].

Figure 5. A force of 400 N acting on the humeral head

The distributions of Equivalent Stress (Von Mises), Total

Deformation and Equivalent Elastic Strain are illustrated in
Fig. 6, Fig. 7 and Fig. 8.
Table 1. Mechanical properties of materials

Properties

UM
2

Trabecular
bone
9

Cortical bone
9

Hydroxy-

Collagen

apatite

fibers

Prosthesis
Co-28Cr-6Mo
alloy

Prosthesis
Ti-6Al-4V
alloy
123*109

Young Modulus

N/m

3*10

14.2*10

54,3*106

3*109

2,08*1011

Poissons Ratio

0.12

0.3

0.28

0.35

0.315

0,3

0.3

Density

kg/m3

800

2100

3156

2000

2578

8300

4429

Tensile Yield
Strength

N/m2

7.4*106

0.15*109

8,5*106

827*106

Compression
Yield Strength

N/m2

12.52*106

182*106

Ultimate Yield
Strength

N/m2

5*106

100*106

2,5*107

1,05*109

Thermal expan.

/Kelvin

27.5*10-6

27.5*10-6

17*10-6

6*10-4

1.129*10-6

9*10-6

Thermal
conductivity

W/m*K

0.38

0.38

6,7

Specific heat

J/Kg*K

1260

1260

3900

586

114*10

In this study we considered a subject with a mass of 80 Kg in

handstand position. This means that a force of approximately
400 N acts on each upper limb. The behavior of the humerus
and humerus-prosthesis assembly will be analyzed using three
parameters: Equivalent Stress (Von Mises), Total Deformation
and Equivalent Elastic Strain.
Seven scenarios were analyzed: (1) healthy humerus, (2)
humerus and uncoated Ti-6Al-4V alloy prosthesis, (3) Humerus and Ti-6Al-4V alloy prosthesis coated with Hydroxyapatite, (4) Humerus and Ti-6Al-4V alloy prosthesis coated
with one layer of Hydroxyapatite and one layer of Collagen
fibers, (5) Humerus and Ti-6Al-4V alloy prosthesis coated
with one layer of composite material (HAP and Collagen
fibers), (6) Humerus and Co-28Cr-6Mo alloy prosthesis
coated with one layer of Hydroxyapatite and one layer of
Collagen fibers, (7) Humerus and Co-28Cr-6Mo alloy prosthesis coated with one layer of composite material (HAP
and Collagen fibers).
Scenario 1 Healthy humerus
A force of 400 N was applied on the humeral head as illustrated in Fig. 5.

Composite
material
(HAP+collagen)

The Equivalent Stress is distributed along the bone with a

peak value on the Medial Epicondyle. The Total deformation
distribution has a maximum on the humeral head and is insignificant on the distal part of the bone.
The Equivalent Elastic Strain is distributed along the bone
with a maximum on the Medial Epicondyle as can be seen in
Fig. 8.

Figure 6 The Equivalent stress on healthy humerus

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HERLE ET AL.
Scenario 3 Humerus and Ti alloy prosthesis coated with hydroxyapatite

Figure 7 Total deformation distribution on healthy humerus

The prosthesiss stem was covered with a 2 mm hydroxyapatite layer. For the same force of 400 N applied on the ball of the
prosthesis, the Equivalent Stress is concentrated on the neck of
the prosthesis, like in previous scenario, but a 10% diminution
was encountered. This fact confirms that the presence of the hydroxyapatite as an interface between bone and prosthetic device
is a benefit. The total deformation was smaller than in previous
scenario with more than 50%. Also the Equivalent Elastic Strain
was three times smaller than in previous scenario, with a distribution similar to that of a healthy humerus.
Scenario 4 Humerus and Ti alloy prosthesis coated with two
layers of hydroxyapatite an collagen fibers
For this scenario the stem of the prosthesis was covered with
1 mm hydroxyapatite layer. Over this layer a second layer of
collagen with a thickness of 1 mm was added. The values of
the three parameters: Equivalent Stress, Total Deformation and
Equivalent Elastic Strain were higher than in the case of prosthesis coated with a 2 mm hydroxyapatite layer. The distribution of the equivalent elastic strain is concentrated into the collagen layer, as can be seen in Fig. 10.

Figure 8 The Equivalent Elastic Strain distribution on healthy humerus

Scenario 2 Humerus and uncoated Ti alloy prosthesis

The same force of 400 N was applied on the ball of the
prosthesis. Unlike the case of healthy bone, in this case the
Equivalent Stress is concentrated on the neck of the prosthesis
as can be seen in Fig 9. This happens because the anatomy of
the bone was modified.
The Total deformation has the same distribution like in scenario 1, with a maximum value on the ball of the prosthesis.
The value of the total deformation is smaller than in the first
scenario.
The Equivalent Elastic Strain is concentrated at the surface
contact between the bone and the neck of the prosthesis.

Figure 9 The Equivalent stress distribution on the uncoated prosthesis

Scenario 5 Humerus and Ti alloy prosthesis coated with two

millimeters of composite material
A layer of hydroxyapatite and collagen fibers in composite
material with a thickness of 2 mm was considered as interface
between bone and prosthesis. The maximum value of Equivalent
Stress determined after simulation was higher than in the scenarios were prosthesis was coated with hydroxyapatite. The Equivalent Stress was distributed in the coating layer, in the neck area
of the prosthesis. The Total Deformation distribution was similar
with that encountered in previous two scenarios, but the value of
it was smaller. The Equivalent Elastic Strain has a maximum
value in the coating layer.

Figure 10 The Equivalent Elastic Strain distributions on collagen layer

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SIMULATION-BASED STRESS ANALYSIS

Scenario 6 Humerus and Co alloy prosthesis coated with two
layers of hydroxyapatite an collagen fibers
For this scenario the stem of the prosthesis made of Co28Cr-6Mo alloy, was covered with a 1 mm thick hydroxyapatite layer. Over this layer a second layer of collagen with a
thickness of 1 mm was added. The maximum value of Equivalent Stress was higher than in the case of Ti alloy prosthesis
coated with the same two layers, but the maximum value of
Total Deformation was 20% smaller. The maximum value and
the distribution of the Equivalent Elastic Strain is comparable
with the case of Ti alloy made prosthesis.
Scenario 7 Humerus and Co alloy prosthesis coated with 2
mm of composite material

A 2mm layer of hydroxyapatite and collagen fibers in composite material was considered as interface between bone and
prosthesis The maximum value of Equivalent Stress determined after simulation was higher than in the scenarios were
prosthesis was made on Ti alloy coated with the same layer of
composite material.
The Total Deformation distribution was similar with that
encountered in Scenario 5, but the value of it was smaller. Like
in the previous scenario, the maximum value and the distribution of the Equivalent Elastic Strain is comparable with the
case of Ti alloy made prosthesis.
To summarize the results, Table 2 presents the maximum
value and the location for Equivalent Stress (Von Mises), Total
Deformation and Equivalent Elastic Strain, in the seven scenarios described above.
Table 2. Maximum values of mechanical parameters

Scenario

Equivalent Stress

Total Deformation

Equivalent Elastic Strain

max. value
[MPa]

localization

max. value
[mm]

localization

max. value
[mm/mm]

localization

Humerus (H)

11,69

Medial Epicondyle

2,4222

Head

0,00082324

Medial Epicondyle

S2

H + Ti alloy prosthesis (TiP)

185,2

prosthesis proximal

1,7163

prosthesis head

0,0033365

bone-prosthesis
interface

S3

H+TiP+Hydroxyapatite
(HPA) 2 mm

167,34

prosthesis proximal

0,87227

prosthesis head

0,0014287

bone-prosthesis
interface

S4

H+TiP+HPA 1mm + Colagen

fibers (CF)1mm

297,19

prosthesis proximal

1,3527

prosthesis head

0,0038567

colagen layer

S5

H+TiP+composit material
HPA and colagen(CM) 2mm

368,48

coating layer

0,54623

prosthesis head

0,00090898

bone-prosthesis
interface

S6

H+Co alloy prosthesis (CoP)

+HPA 1mm +CF 1mm

385,5

prosthesis porous layer

1,12

prosthesis head

0,0033706

colagen layer

S7

H+CoP+ CM 2mm

392,92

coating layer

0,49459

prosthesis head

0,00085113

Medial Epicondyle

Description

S1

Using collagen fibers as an interface between the prosthetic

device and the bone increases the stress as can be observed in
Fig. 11. This happens due to the mechanical properties of the
collagen which are worse than those of the other components
of the humerus-prosthesis assembly.
The Total deformation has a maximum in the healthy bone

500,000
Equivalent Stress
[MPa]

as can be observed in Fig.12. This means that from this

point of view any solution described by the scenarios 2 to
7 is feasibleness. However the cobalt alloy prosthesis covered with composite material is recommended due to the
smallest deformation encountered when the same forces
was applied.

400,000
300,000
200,000
100,000
0,000
Scenarios

S1
S2
S3
S4
S5
S6
S7

Figure 11 The maximum value of Equivalent Stress in the scenarios considered

Total Deformation
[mm]

No.

S1
S2
S3
S4
S5
S6
S7

2,5
2
1,5
1
0,5
0

Scenarios

Figure 12 The maximum value of Total deformation in the scenarios considered

348

Equivalent Elastic Strain

[mm/mm]

HERLE ET AL.
0,005
S1

0,004

S2
S3

0,003

S4

0,002

S5
S6

0,001
0

Analyses presented in this paper revealed the fact that there

is no ideal solution for prostheses coating.
Each solution has advantages and disadvantages, and the decision to choose a particular solution depends on factors related
to patient and surgical conditions.
Using the models developed in this paper, it is also possible
to analyze other materials.
We intend to analyze in the future materials like chitosan,
which is used as interface between prosthesis device and the
bone.

S7

REFERENCES

Scenarios

Figure 13 Maximum Equivalent Elastic Strain in the scenarios considered

Analyzing the values in Fig. 13 we can observe that the maximum equivalent elastic strain has comparable values for the
healthy bone and the humerus-prosthesis assembly when the
interface between bone and prosthesis is the composite material
made of hydroxyapatite and collagen fibers.
IV. CONCLUSION
The developed models can be used to study mechanical phenomena in the bone-prosthesis assembly. These models are
very important because they allow determining maximum values of parameters like tensile yield strength, compression yield
strength, ultimate yield strength, etc. Making tests in vivo, is
almost impossible because if they are not conducted very carefully they can generate harmful irreversible phenomena, i.e.
breaking of the bone or prosthesis elements. By means of these
models we can analyze different materials in a practical fashion
and we can determine which solution is a best fit for a certain
case.
One important characteristic of the models presented in this
paper is their versatility. This is very important because of the
variable dimensions and shape of the human humerus, which
can vary from person to person.

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