Creep rupture of polypropylene sutures as a function of diameter, radiation dose and temperature.

The failure of polypropylene (PP) sutures was studied via creep rupture tests. Linear relationships were generated from plots of log time to break (tB) versus stress (sigma). At a constant sigma the results showed that tB was inversely proportional to the suture diameter (7-0, 6-0, 5-0 and 4-0) and to the radiation dose (0, 15, 20, 25 and 50 Mrad). Moreover, for the 6-0 suture size at a 15 Mrad dose, tB decreased with increasing temperature (26, 37, 44, 50 and 60 degrees C). For this creep rupture process the activation energy equalled 91.2 kJ/mol (21.8 kcal/mol). A mechanism for failure was presented which assumes that these sutures are bundles of oriented, semicrystalline microfibrils.