Analysis of the influence of independent variables used for reconstruction of a traumatic brain injury incident

Traumatic brain injuries contribute to a high degree of morbidity and mortality in society. To study traumatic brain injuries researchers reconstruct the event using both physical and FE models. The purpose of these reconstructions is to correlate the brain deformation metric to the type of injury as a measure for prediction. These reconstructions are guided by a series of independent variables which all have influence upon the outcome variables. This research uses a combination of physical and FE modelling to quantify how independent variables such as velocity and impact vector (angle) contribute to the resulting variance in brain deformation metrics. The results indicated that using a Hybrid III neck controls the rotational acceleration response from an impact. Also, it was found that strain rate and product of strain and strain rate were more sensitive to changes in impact angle. Linear acceleration decreased with increasing impact angle, while brain deformations did not follow this trend, which suggests that peak linear acceleration may not be the only factor in the production of larger brain deformations.