Impact characteristics of articular cartilage.

A rigid l m high stainless steel drop tower employing linear bearings has been used to study the impact characteristics of human articular cartilage. Instrumentation included a specially designed optoelctronic position transducer, piezoelectric force transducer, and high speed storage oscilloscope. Forty-eight 9 mm diameter samples of living articular cartilage and subchondral bone from the tibial plateaus of 4 human donors have been impacted at strains from 10 to 50%, and strain rates of 500s-1 and 1000 s-1. The integral bone/cartilage samples were mounted in polymethyl methacrylate for testing. Bone and cement impact characteristics have been studied separately. Stress, strain, and energy absorption data have been assembled for all the samples. Chondrocyte viability subsequent to impact has been investigated with the use of tritum labeled proline and autoradiography. Viability has been studied in relation to both the mechanical data and structural damage.