L2M – Pliantech

Spinal disorders are the largest cause of years lived with disability globally. Artificial disc replacement (ADR) is a common surgical approach to address dis degeneration, but reoperation rates can remain as high as 20%. Mechanical analysis of on-market designs and discussions with spine surgeons suggest this is linked to the mechanical design of the implants leading to adjacent segment disease (ASD) by placing higher loads above and below the spinal level of operation. The goal of this project is to characterize and develop a novel implant design for ADR to see how varying different properties in structure of flexures in the implant affect its mechanical performance. Designs will be 3D-printed in titanium and tested with a mechanical loading 6 degree-of-freedom joint simulator, as well as simulated response with a finite element analysis software. The designs will be simulated in compression (Fz), torsion (Mz), lateral bending (My), and flexion extension (Mx) loading. For mechanical testing, the flexures were printed between custom-designed endplates to attach to the AMTI VIVO joint motion simulator. Designs are set to be tested under the same loading conditions as the simulation, with the primitive flexure response captured using a 3D digital image correlation system. These results will provide new understanding of the mechanical behaviour of additively manufactured primitive flexures for the implant design. This will help with the validation work on the potential health care application of this project. For the partner organization, this project supports the development of a Canadian enterprise and increases the likelihood of translating academic research from the lab to a commercial application. The end benefit for users is a potentially improved disc replacement design with more natural biomechanical properties.

Faculty Supervisor:

Stewart McLachlin

Student:

Partner:

DMZ Ventures Inc

Discipline:

Engineering

Sector:

Biotechnology; Health and Related Sciences & Technology; Advanced Manufacturing

University:

University of Waterloo

Program: