Moss William C, King Michael J, Blackman Eric G
a Weapons and Complex Integration Directorate, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory , 7000 East Avenue, L-99, Livermore , CA 94551 , USA.
Comput Methods Biomech Biomed Engin. 2014;17(11):1173-84. doi: 10.1080/10255842.2012.739162. Epub 2012 Dec 18.
We use computational simulations to compare the impact response of different football and U.S. Army helmet pad materials. We conduct experiments to characterise the material response of different helmet pads. We simulate experimental helmet impact tests performed by the U.S. Army to validate our methods. We then simulate a cylindrical impactor striking different pads. The acceleration history of the impactor is used to calculate the head injury criterion for each pad. We conduct sensitivity studies exploring the effects of pad composition, geometry and material stiffness. We find that (1) the football pad materials do not outperform the currently used military pad material in militarily relevant impact scenarios; (2) optimal material properties for a pad depend on impact energy and (3) thicker pads perform better at all velocities. Although we considered only the isolated response of pad materials, not entire helmet systems, our analysis suggests that by using larger helmet shells with correspondingly thicker pads, impact-induced traumatic brain injury may be reduced.
我们使用计算机模拟来比较不同橄榄球头盔和美国陆军头盔衬垫材料的撞击响应。我们进行实验以表征不同头盔衬垫的材料响应。我们模拟了美国陆军进行的实验性头盔撞击测试，以验证我们的方法。然后，我们模拟了一个圆柱形撞击器撞击不同衬垫的情况。撞击器的加速度历史用于计算每个衬垫的头部损伤标准。我们进行了敏感性研究，探讨衬垫成分、几何形状和材料刚度的影响。我们发现：（1）在军事相关的撞击场景中，橄榄球头盔衬垫材料并不优于目前使用的军事衬垫材料；（2）衬垫的最佳材料特性取决于撞击能量；（3）在所有速度下，较厚的衬垫表现更好。尽管我们仅考虑了衬垫材料的孤立响应，而非整个头盔系统，但我们的分析表明，通过使用更大的头盔外壳和相应更厚的衬垫，可能会减少撞击引起的创伤性脑损伤。
