5 Modelling of the Brain for Injury Simulation and Prevention
127
5.5 Conclusions
A large number of FE human and animal brain models for blunt impact simulations
have been published. We do not know what motivated the development of so many
brain injury models but one of the reasons must be related to the desire of model
developers to show that their model is better than existing ones. This reason alone
should not be the primary basis for more model development. To varying extents,
these models have been validated against a very limited number experimental
datasets in which insufficient details were available to accurately define the model
geometry, loading conditions, and impact responses. For this reason, continued
development of new human brain models is not likely to improve the quality of
these models or provide additional insights. However, the possibility of having
another ‘run-of-the-mill’ human brain model published in the literature is highly
likely because the resources needed to develop a computer model is nothing more
than a high-end computer and a commercially available software package. The
‘convenient’ way of automatically generating meshes in a brain shape probably
added more incentives of developing a new head model. It is sad to see that some
journal reviewers are not requiring all models to demonstrate proper convergence,
validation, and accuracy. More importantly, we will continue to see FE modelderived injury thresholds without the acknowledgement that these thresholds are
model dependent and not necessarily universally valid or even reliable. On the other
hand, sharing of high-quality human head models is becoming popular in recent
years through GHBMC, THUMS, and NHTSA at near-zero costs for academic
research institutions. At WSU, we provide a 10-year-old and a 70-year-old female
whole-body human models free of charge for academic research institutions to
investigate injury-related issues (https://automotivesafety.wayne.edu/). The recent
European PIPER project aimed at developing and providing open-source tools to
position and personalise existing adult human body models, as well as a new opensource human body model of a child scalable to represent ages between 1.5 and
10 years old (http://piper-project.org), may also speed up model development. As
the user base increases, it is hoped that continued improvements of these models
can be made.
To stream the model development effort into the focus of high-quality, accurate
models, we need high-quality experimental data, especially animal experiments,
designed to acquire biomechanical and injury data for model validation. With a
majority of government (such as NIH) funding being directed towards translational
research and treatment, very little resources are still available to prevent TBI from
happening even though prevention is the best treatment for TBI. Automotive and
sports equipment manufacturers have a keen interest in preventing TBI. However,
these companies are not willing to support animal research because bad press can
hurt their business. Until this culture is changed, one may continue to see more TBI
victims in the years to come. It is hoped that this chapter can change some minds
to redirect more effort and funding to developing better FE human head models
to reduce the number of future TBI victims. Meanwhile, modellers in the field are
127
5.5 Conclusions
A large number of FE human and animal brain models for blunt impact simulations
have been published. We do not know what motivated the development of so many
brain injury models but one of the reasons must be related to the desire of model
developers to show that their model is better than existing ones. This reason alone
should not be the primary basis for more model development. To varying extents,
these models have been validated against a very limited number experimental
datasets in which insufficient details were available to accurately define the model
geometry, loading conditions, and impact responses. For this reason, continued
development of new human brain models is not likely to improve the quality of
these models or provide additional insights. However, the possibility of having
another ‘run-of-the-mill’ human brain model published in the literature is highly
likely because the resources needed to develop a computer model is nothing more
than a high-end computer and a commercially available software package. The
‘convenient’ way of automatically generating meshes in a brain shape probably
added more incentives of developing a new head model. It is sad to see that some
journal reviewers are not requiring all models to demonstrate proper convergence,
validation, and accuracy. More importantly, we will continue to see FE modelderived injury thresholds without the acknowledgement that these thresholds are
model dependent and not necessarily universally valid or even reliable. On the other
hand, sharing of high-quality human head models is becoming popular in recent
years through GHBMC, THUMS, and NHTSA at near-zero costs for academic
research institutions. At WSU, we provide a 10-year-old and a 70-year-old female
whole-body human models free of charge for academic research institutions to
investigate injury-related issues (https://automotivesafety.wayne.edu/). The recent
European PIPER project aimed at developing and providing open-source tools to
position and personalise existing adult human body models, as well as a new opensource human body model of a child scalable to represent ages between 1.5 and
10 years old (http://piper-project.org), may also speed up model development. As
the user base increases, it is hoped that continued improvements of these models
can be made.
To stream the model development effort into the focus of high-quality, accurate
models, we need high-quality experimental data, especially animal experiments,
designed to acquire biomechanical and injury data for model validation. With a
majority of government (such as NIH) funding being directed towards translational
research and treatment, very little resources are still available to prevent TBI from
happening even though prevention is the best treatment for TBI. Automotive and
sports equipment manufacturers have a keen interest in preventing TBI. However,
these companies are not willing to support animal research because bad press can
hurt their business. Until this culture is changed, one may continue to see more TBI
victims in the years to come. It is hoped that this chapter can change some minds
to redirect more effort and funding to developing better FE human head models
to reduce the number of future TBI victims. Meanwhile, modellers in the field are