![Giovanni Borelli - lim joints (De Motu Animalium)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d5/Giovanni_Borelli_-_lim_joints_%28De_Motu_Animalium%29.jpg)
Biomechanics is the study of the structure, function and motion of the mechanical aspects of biological systems, at any level from whole
organism
In biology, an organism () is any living system that functions as an individual entity. All organisms are composed of cells (cell theory). Organisms are classified by taxonomy into groups such as multicellular animals, plants, and ...
s to
organs
In biology, an organ is a collection of tissues joined in a structural unit to serve a common function. In the hierarchy of life, an organ lies between tissue and an organ system. Tissues are formed from same type cells to act together in a f ...
,
cells and
cell organelle
In cell biology, an organelle is a specialized subunit, usually within a cell, that has a specific function. The name ''organelle'' comes from the idea that these structures are parts of cells, as organs are to the body, hence ''organelle,'' th ...
s, using the methods of
mechanics
Mechanics (from Ancient Greek: μηχανική, ''mēkhanikḗ'', "of machines") is the area of mathematics and physics concerned with the relationships between force, matter, and motion among physical objects. Forces applied to objects r ...
. Biomechanics is a branch of
biophysics
Biophysics is an interdisciplinary science that applies approaches and methods traditionally used in physics to study biological phenomena. Biophysics covers all scales of biological organization, from molecular to organismic and populations. ...
.
In 2022, computational mechanics goes far beyond pure mechanics, and involves other physical actions: chemistry, heat and mass transfer, electric and magnetic stimuli and many others.
Etymology
The word "biomechanics" (1899) and the related "biomechanical" (1856) come from the
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...
βίος ''bios'' "life" and μηχανική, ''mēchanikē'' "mechanics", to refer to the study of the mechanical principles of living organisms, particularly their movement and structure.
Subfields
Biofluid mechanics
![Redbloodcells](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/13/Redbloodcells.jpg)
Biological fluid mechanics, or biofluid mechanics, is the study of both gas and liquid fluid flows in or around biological organisms. An often studied liquid biofluid problem is that of blood flow in the human cardiovascular system. Under certain mathematical circumstances,
blood
Blood is a body fluid in the circulatory system of humans and other vertebrates that delivers necessary substances such as nutrients and oxygen to the cells, and transports metabolic waste products away from those same cells. Blood in the c ...
flow can be modeled by the
Navier–Stokes equations
In physics, the Navier–Stokes equations ( ) are partial differential equations which describe the motion of viscous fluid substances, named after French engineer and physicist Claude-Louis Navier and Anglo-Irish physicist and mathematician Geo ...
. ''In vivo''
whole blood
Whole blood (WB) is human blood from a standard blood donation. It is used in the treatment of massive bleeding, in exchange transfusion, and when people donate blood to themselves. One unit of whole blood (~517 mls) brings up hemoglobin lev ...
is assumed to be an incompressible
Newtonian fluid
A Newtonian fluid is a fluid in which the viscous stresses arising from its flow are at every point linearly correlated to the local strain rate — the rate of change of its deformation over time. Stresses are proportional to the rate of chang ...
. However, this assumption fails when considering forward flow within
arterioles
An arteriole is a small-diameter blood vessel in the microcirculation that extends and branches out from an artery and leads to capillaries.
Arterioles have muscular walls (usually only one to two layers of smooth muscle cells) and are the primar ...
. At the microscopic scale, the effects of individual
red blood cells
Red blood cells (RBCs), also referred to as red cells, red blood corpuscles (in humans or other animals not having nucleus in red blood cells), haematids, erythroid cells or erythrocytes (from Greek language, Greek ''erythros'' for "red" and ''k ...
become significant, and whole blood can no longer be modeled as a continuum. When the diameter of the blood vessel is just slightly larger than the diameter of the red blood cell the
Fahraeus–Lindquist effect occurs and there is a decrease in wall
shear stress
Shear stress, often denoted by (Greek: tau), is the component of stress coplanar with a material cross section. It arises from the shear force, the component of force vector parallel to the material cross section. ''Normal stress'', on the ot ...
. However, as the diameter of the blood vessel decreases further, the red blood cells have to squeeze through the vessel and often can only pass in a single file. In this case, the inverse Fahraeus–Lindquist effect occurs and the wall shear stress increases.
An example of a gaseous biofluids problem is that of human respiration. Recently, respiratory systems in insects have been studied for
bioinspiration
Bioinspiration is the development of novel materials, devices, and structures inspired by solutions found in biological evolution and refinement which has occurred over millions of years. The goal is to improve modeling and simulation of the biolog ...
for designing improved microfluidic devices.
Biotribology
Biotribology is the study of
friction
Friction is the force resisting the relative motion of solid surfaces, fluid layers, and material elements sliding against each other. There are several types of friction:
*Dry friction is a force that opposes the relative lateral motion of t ...
,
wear
Wear is the damaging, gradual removal or deformation of material at solid surfaces. Causes of wear can be mechanical (e.g., erosion) or chemical (e.g., corrosion). The study of wear and related processes is referred to as tribology.
Wear in m ...
and
lubrication
Lubrication is the process or technique of using a lubricant to reduce friction and wear and tear in a contact between two surfaces. The study of lubrication is a discipline in the field of tribology.
Lubrication mechanisms such as fluid-lubric ...
of biological systems especially human joints such as hips and knees. In general, these processes are studied in the context of
contact mechanics
Contact mechanics is the study of the deformation of solids that touch each other at one or more points.Johnson, K. L, 1985, Contact mechanics, Cambridge University Press.Popov, Valentin L., 2010, ''Contact Mechanics and Friction. Physical P ...
and
tribology
Tribology is the science and engineering of interacting surfaces in relative Motion (physics), motion. It includes the study and application of the principles of friction, lubrication and wear. Tribology is highly interdisciplinary, drawing on m ...
.
Additional aspects of biotribology include analysis of subsurface damage resulting from two surfaces coming in contact during motion, i.e. rubbing against each other, such as in the evaluation of tissue-engineered cartilage.
Comparative biomechanics
![penguinu](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/Penguinu.jpg)
Comparative biomechanics is the application of biomechanics to non-human organisms, whether used to gain greater insights into humans (as in
physical anthropology
Biological anthropology, also known as physical anthropology, is a scientific discipline concerned with the biological and behavioral aspects of human beings, their extinct Hominini, hominin ancestors, and related non-human primates, particularly ...
) or into the functions, ecology and adaptations of the organisms themselves. Common areas of investigation are
Animal locomotion
Animal locomotion, in ethology, is any of a variety of methods that animal (biology), animals use to move from one place to another. Some modes of locomotion are (initially) self-propelled, e.g., running, swimming, jumping, flying, hopping, soari ...
and
feeding
Eating (also known as consuming) is the ingestion of food, typically to provide a heterotrophic organism with energy and to allow for growth. Animals and other heterotrophs must eat in order to survive — carnivores eat other animals, herbi ...
, as these have strong connections to the organism's
fitness and impose high mechanical demands. Animal locomotion, has many manifestations, including
running
Running is a method of terrestrial locomotion allowing humans and other animals to move rapidly on foot. Running is a type of gait characterized by an aerial phase in which all feet are above the ground (though there are exceptions). This is ...
,
jumping
Jumping or leaping is a form of locomotion or movement in which an organism or non-living (e.g., robotic) mechanical system propels itself through the air along a ballistic trajectory. Jumping can be distinguished from running, galloping and o ...
and
flying. Locomotion requires
energy
In physics, energy (from Ancient Greek: ἐνέργεια, ''enérgeia'', “activity”) is the quantitative property that is transferred to a body or to a physical system, recognizable in the performance of work and in the form of heat a ...
to overcome
friction
Friction is the force resisting the relative motion of solid surfaces, fluid layers, and material elements sliding against each other. There are several types of friction:
*Dry friction is a force that opposes the relative lateral motion of t ...
,
drag,
inertia
Inertia is the idea that an object will continue its current motion until some force causes its speed or direction to change. The term is properly understood as shorthand for "the principle of inertia" as described by Newton in his first law ...
, and
gravity
In physics, gravity () is a fundamental interaction which causes mutual attraction between all things with mass or energy. Gravity is, by far, the weakest of the four fundamental interactions, approximately 1038 times weaker than the stro ...
, though which factor predominates varies with environment.
Comparative biomechanics overlaps strongly with many other fields, including
ecology
Ecology () is the study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community, ecosystem, and biosphere level. Ecology overlaps wi ...
,
neurobiology
Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system (the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system), its functions and disorders. It is a multidisciplinary science that combines physiology, anatomy, molecular biology, developme ...
,
developmental biology
Developmental biology is the study of the process by which animals and plants grow and develop. Developmental biology also encompasses the biology of Regeneration (biology), regeneration, asexual reproduction, metamorphosis, and the growth and di ...
,
ethology
Ethology is the scientific study of animal behaviour, usually with a focus on behaviour under natural conditions, and viewing behaviour as an evolutionarily adaptive trait. Behaviourism as a term also describes the scientific and objectiv ...
, and
paleontology
Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossi ...
, to the extent of commonly publishing papers in the journals of these other fields. Comparative biomechanics is often applied in medicine (with regards to common model organisms such as mice and rats) as well as in
biomimetics, which looks to nature for solutions to engineering problems.
Computational biomechanics
Computational biomechanics is the application of engineering computational tools, such as the
Finite element method
The finite element method (FEM) is a popular method for numerically solving differential equations arising in engineering and mathematical modeling. Typical problem areas of interest include the traditional fields of structural analysis, heat ...
to study the mechanics of biological systems. Computational models and simulations are used to predict the relationship between parameters that are otherwise challenging to test experimentally, or used to design more relevant experiments reducing the time and costs of experiments. Mechanical modeling using finite element analysis has been used to interpret the experimental observation of plant cell growth to understand how they differentiate, for instance.
In medicine, over the past decade, the
Finite element method
The finite element method (FEM) is a popular method for numerically solving differential equations arising in engineering and mathematical modeling. Typical problem areas of interest include the traditional fields of structural analysis, heat ...
has become an established alternative to
in vivo
Studies that are ''in vivo'' (Latin for "within the living"; often not italicized in English) are those in which the effects of various biological entities are tested on whole, living organisms or cells, usually animals, including humans, and ...
surgical assessment. One of the main advantages of computational biomechanics lies in its ability to determine the endo-anatomical response of an anatomy, without being subject to ethical restrictions. This has led FE modeling (or other discretization techniques) to the point of becoming ubiquitous in several fields of Biomechanics while several projects have even adopted an open source philosophy (e.g. BioSpine) and SOniCS, as well as the SOFA, FEniCS frameworks and FEBio.
Computational biomechanics is an essential ingredient in surgical simulation, which is used for surgical planning, assistance and training. In this case, numerical (discretization) methods are used to compute, as fast as possible, the response of a system to boundary conditions such as forces, heat and mass transfer, electrical and magnetic stimuli.
Experimental biomechanics
Experimental biomechanics is the application of
experiment
An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into Causality, cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome oc ...
s and
measurement
Measurement is the quantification of attributes of an object or event, which can be used to compare with other objects or events.
In other words, measurement is a process of determining how large or small a physical quantity is as compared ...
s in biomechanics.
Continuum biomechanics
The mechanical analysis of
biomaterial
A biomaterial is a substance that has been engineered to interact with biological systems for a medical purpose, either a therapeutic (treat, augment, repair, or replace a tissue function of the body) or a diagnostic one. As a science, biomateria ...
s and biofluids is usually carried forth with the concepts of
continuum mechanics
Continuum mechanics is a branch of mechanics that deals with the mechanical behavior of materials modeled as a continuous mass rather than as discrete particles. The French mathematician Augustin-Louis Cauchy was the first to formulate such m ...
. This assumption breaks down when the
length scale
In physics, length scale is a particular length or distance determined with the precision of at most a few orders of magnitude. The concept of length scale is particularly important because physical phenomena of different length scales cannot af ...
s of interest approach the order of the micro structural details of the material. One of the most remarkable characteristic of biomaterials is their
hierarchical
A hierarchy (from Greek: , from , 'president of sacred rites') is an arrangement of items (objects, names, values, categories, etc.) that are represented as being "above", "below", or "at the same level as" one another. Hierarchy is an important ...
structure. In other words, the mechanical characteristics of these materials rely on physical phenomena occurring in multiple levels, from the
molecular all the way up to the
tissue and
organ levels.
Biomaterials are classified in two groups, hard and
soft tissues
Soft tissue is all the tissue in the body that is not hardened by the processes of ossification or calcification such as bones and teeth. Soft tissue connects, surrounds or supports internal organs and bones, and includes muscle, tendons, ligam ...
. Mechanical deformation of hard tissues (like
wood
Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin th ...
,
shell
Shell may refer to:
Architecture and design
* Shell (structure), a thin structure
** Concrete shell, a thin shell of concrete, usually with no interior columns or exterior buttresses
** Thin-shell structure
Science Biology
* Seashell, a hard o ...
and
bone
A bone is a Stiffness, rigid Organ (biology), organ that constitutes part of the skeleton in most vertebrate animals. Bones protect the various other organs of the body, produce red blood cell, red and white blood cells, store minerals, provid ...
) may be analysed with the theory of
linear elasticity
Linear elasticity is a mathematical model of how solid objects deform and become internally stressed due to prescribed loading conditions. It is a simplification of the more general nonlinear theory of elasticity and a branch of continuum mec ...
. On the other hand, soft tissues (like
skin
Skin is the layer of usually soft, flexible outer tissue covering the body of a vertebrate animal, with three main functions: protection, regulation, and sensation.
Other cuticle, animal coverings, such as the arthropod exoskeleton, have diffe ...
,
tendon
A tendon or sinew is a tough, high-tensile-strength band of dense fibrous connective tissue that connects muscle to bone. It is able to transmit the mechanical forces of muscle contraction to the skeletal system without sacrificing its ability ...
,
muscle
Skeletal muscles (commonly referred to as muscles) are organs of the vertebrate muscular system and typically are attached by tendons to bones of a skeleton. The muscle cells of skeletal muscles are much longer than in the other types of muscl ...
and
cartilage
Cartilage is a resilient and smooth type of connective tissue. In tetrapods, it covers and protects the ends of long bones at the joints as articular cartilage, and is a structural component of many body parts including the rib cage, the neck an ...
) usually undergo large deformations and thus their analysis rely on the
finite strain theory
In continuum mechanics, the finite strain theory—also called large strain theory, or large deformation theory—deals with deformations in which strains and/or rotations are large enough to invalidate assumptions inherent in infinitesimal strai ...
and
computer simulation
Computer simulation is the process of mathematical modelling, performed on a computer, which is designed to predict the behaviour of, or the outcome of, a real-world or physical system. The reliability of some mathematical models can be dete ...
s. The interest in continuum biomechanics is spurred by the need for realism in the development of medical simulation.
Plant biomechanics
The application of biomechanical principles to plants, plant organs and cells has developed into the subfield of plant biomechanics.
Application of biomechanics for plants ranges from studying the resilience of crops to environmental stress to development and morphogenesis at cell and tissue scale, overlapping with
mechanobiology.
Sports biomechanics
In sports biomechanics, the laws of mechanics are applied to human movement in order to gain a greater understanding of athletic performance and to reduce
sport injuries as well. It focuses on the application of the scientific principles of mechanical physics to understand movements of action of human bodies and sports implements such as cricket bat, hockey stick and javelin etc. Elements of
mechanical engineering
Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, and ...
(e.g.,
strain gauges),
electrical engineering
Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems which use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...
(e.g.,
digital filter
In signal processing, a digital filter is a system that performs mathematical operations on a sampled, discrete-time signal to reduce or enhance certain aspects of that signal. This is in contrast to the other major type of electronic filter, t ...
ing),
computer science
Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...
(e.g.,
numerical methods
Numerical analysis is the study of algorithms that use numerical approximation (as opposed to symbolic manipulations) for the problems of mathematical analysis (as distinguished from discrete mathematics). It is the study of numerical methods th ...
),
gait analysis
Gait analysis is the systematic study of animal locomotion, more specifically the study of human motion, using the eye and the brain of observers, augmented by instrumentation for measuring body movements, body mechanics, and the activity of the ...
(e.g.,
force platform
Force platforms or force plates are measuring instruments that measure the ground reaction forces generated by a body standing on or moving across them, to quantify balance, gait and other parameters of biomechanics. Most common areas of applic ...
s), and
clinical neurophysiology
Clinical neurophysiology is a medical specialty that studies the central and peripheral nervous systems through the recording of bioelectrical activity, whether spontaneous or stimulated. It encompasses both research regarding the pathophysiology ...
(e.g.,
surface EMG) are common methods used in sports biomechanics.
Biomechanics in sports can be stated as the muscular, joint and skeletal actions of the body during the execution of a given task, skill and/or technique. Proper understanding of biomechanics relating to sports skill has the greatest implications on: sport's performance, rehabilitation and injury prevention, along with sport mastery. As noted by Doctor Michael Yessis, one could say that best athlete is the one that executes his or her skill the best.
Vascular biomechanics
The main topics of the vascular biomechanics is the description of the mechanical behaviour of vascular tissues.
It is well known that cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death wordlwide. Vascular system in the human body is the main component that is supposed to maintain pressure and allow for blood flow and chemical exchanges. Studying the mechanical properties of this complex tissues improves the possibility to better understanding cardiovascular diseases and drastically improve personalized medicine.
Vascular tissues are inhomogenous with a strongly non linear behaviour. Generally this study involves complex geometry with intricate load conditions and material properties. The correct description of these mechanisms is based on the study of physiology and biological interaction. Therefore is necessary to study wall mechanics and hemodinamics with their interaction.
It is also necessary to premise that the vascular wall is a dynamic structure in continuous evolution. This evolution directly follows the chemical and mechanical environment in which the tissues are immersed like Wall Shear Stress or biochemical signaling.
Other applied subfields of biomechanics include
*
Allometry
Allometry is the study of the relationship of body size to shape, anatomy, physiology and finally behaviour, first outlined by Otto Snell in 1892, by D'Arcy Thompson in 1917 in '' On Growth and Form'' and by Julian Huxley in 1932.
Overview
Allom ...
*
Animal locomotion
Animal locomotion, in ethology, is any of a variety of methods that animal (biology), animals use to move from one place to another. Some modes of locomotion are (initially) self-propelled, e.g., running, swimming, jumping, flying, hopping, soari ...
&
Gait analysis
*Biotribology
* Biofluid mechanics
*
Cardiovascular
The blood circulatory system is a system of organs that includes the heart, blood vessels, and blood which is circulated throughout the entire body of a human or other vertebrate. It includes the cardiovascular system, or vascular system, tha ...
biomechanics
* Comparative biomechanics
* Computational biomechanics
*
Ergonomy
Human factors and ergonomics (commonly referred to as human factors) is the application of psychological and physiological principles to the engineering and design of products, processes, and systems. Four primary goals of human factors learnin ...
*
Forensic Biomechanics Forensic biomechanics is the application of biomechanical engineering science to litigation where biomechanical experts determine whether an accident was the cause of an alleged injury. ''(See "New York State Bar Association Bar Journal Novembe ...
* Human factors engineering & occupational biomechanics
*
Injury biomechanics
*
Implant (medicine)
An implant is a medical device manufactured to replace a missing biological structure, support a damaged biological structure, or enhance an existing biological structure. Medical implants are man-made devices, in contrast to a Organ transplant ...
,
Orthotics
Orthotics ( el, Ορθός, translit=ortho, lit=to straighten, to align) is a medical specialty that focuses on the design and application of orthoses, or braces. An is "an externally applied device used to influence the structural and functio ...
&
Prosthesis
*
Kinaesthetics
Kinaesthetics (or kinesthetics, in American English) is the study of body motion, and of the perception (both conscious and unconscious) of one's own body motions. Kinesthesis is the learning of movements that an individual commonly performs. The ...
*
Kinesiology
Kinesiology () is the scientific study of human body movement. Kinesiology addresses physiological, anatomical, biomechanical, pathological, neuropsychological principles and mechanisms of movement. Applications of kinesiology to human health ...
(kinetics + physiology)
*
Musculoskeletal
The human musculoskeletal system (also known as the human locomotor system, and previously the activity system) is an organ system that gives humans the ability to move using their muscular and skeletal systems. The musculoskeletal system prov ...
& orthopedic biomechanics
*
Rehabilitation
Rehabilitation or Rehab may refer to:
Health
* Rehabilitation (neuropsychology), therapy to regain or improve neurocognitive function that has been lost or diminished
* Rehabilitation (wildlife), treatment of injured wildlife so they can be retur ...
*
Soft body dynamics
Soft-body dynamics is a field of computer graphics that focuses on visually realistic physical simulations of the motion and properties of deformable objects (or ''soft bodies''). The applications are mostly in video games and films. Unlike in sim ...
*
Sports biomechanics
History
Antiquity
Aristotle, a student of Plato can be considered the first bio-mechanic, because of his work with animal anatomy.
Aristotle
Aristotle (; grc-gre, Ἀριστοτέλης ''Aristotélēs'', ; 384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Peripatetic school of phil ...
wrote the first book on the motion of animals, ''
De Motu Animalium'', or
On the Movement of Animals
''Movement of Animals'' (or ''On the Motion of Animals''; Greek Περὶ ζῴων κινήσεως; Latin ''De Motu Animalium'') is one of Aristotle's major texts on biology. It sets out the general principles of animal locomotion
Animal lo ...
. He not only saw animal's bodies as mechanical systems, but pursued questions such as the physiological difference between imagining performing an action and actually doing it. In another work, ''
On the Parts of Animals
''Parts of Animals'' (or ''On the Parts of Animals''; Greek Περὶ ζῴων μορίων; Latin ''De Partibus Animalium'') is one of Aristotle's major texts on biology. It was written around 350 BC. The whole work is roughly a study in animal ...
'', he provided an accurate description of how the
ureter
The ureters are tubes made of smooth muscle that propel urine from the kidneys to the urinary bladder. In a human adult, the ureters are usually long and around in diameter. The ureter is lined by urothelial cells, a type of transitional epit ...
uses
peristalsis
Peristalsis ( , ) is a radially symmetrical contraction and relaxation of muscles that propagate in a wave down a tube, in an anterograde direction. Peristalsis is progression of coordinated contraction of involuntary circular muscles, whic ...
to carry urine from the
kidney
The kidneys are two reddish-brown bean-shaped organs found in vertebrates. They are located on the left and right in the retroperitoneal space, and in adult humans are about in length. They receive blood from the paired renal arteries; blood ...
s to the
bladder
The urinary bladder, or simply bladder, is a hollow organ in humans and other vertebrates that stores urine from the kidneys before disposal by urination. In humans the bladder is a distensible organ that sits on the pelvic floor. Urine enters ...
.
With the rise of the
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterr ...
, technology became more popular than philosophy and the next bio-mechanic arose.
Galen
Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus ( el, Κλαύδιος Γαληνός; September 129 – c. AD 216), often Anglicized as Galen () or Galen of Pergamon, was a Greek physician, surgeon and philosopher in the Roman Empire. Considered to be one of ...
(129 AD-210 AD), physician to
Marcus Aurelius
Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (Latin: áːɾkus̠ auɾέːli.us̠ antɔ́ːni.us̠ English: ; 26 April 121 – 17 March 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 AD and a Stoic philosopher. He was the last of the rulers known as the Five Good ...
, wrote his famous work, On the Function of the Parts (about the human body). This would be the world's standard medical book for the next 1,400 years.
Renaissance
The next major biomechanic would not be around until 1452, with the birth of
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
. Da Vinci was an artist and mechanic and engineer. He contributed to mechanics and military and civil engineering projects. He had a great understanding of science and mechanics and studied anatomy in a mechanics context. He analyzed muscle forces and movements and studied joint functions. These studies could be considered studies in the realm of biomechanics.
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
studied anatomy in the context of mechanics. He analyzed muscle forces as acting along lines connecting origins and insertions, and studied joint function. Da Vinci tended to mimic some animal features in his machines. For example, he studied the flight of birds to find means by which humans could fly; and because horses were the principal source of mechanical power in that time, he studied their muscular systems to design machines that would better benefit from the forces applied by this animal.
In 1543, Galen's work, On the Function of the Parts was challenged by
Andreas Vesalius
Andreas Vesalius (Latinized from Andries van Wezel) () was a 16th-century anatomist, physician, and author of one of the most influential books on human anatomy, ''De Humani Corporis Fabrica Libri Septem'' (''On the fabric of the human body'' ' ...
at the age of 29. Vesalius published his own work called, On the Structure of the Human Body. In this work, Vesalius corrected many errors made by Galen, which would not be globally accepted for many centuries. With the death of Copernicus came a new desire to understand and learn about the world around people and how it works. On his deathbed, he published his work, On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres. This work not only revolutionized science and physics, but also the development of mechanics and later bio-mechanics.
Galileo Galilei
Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642) was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a polymath. Commonly referred to as Galileo, his name was pronounced (, ). He was ...
, the father of mechanics and part time biomechanic was born 21 years after the death of
Copernicus
Nicolaus Copernicus (; pl, Mikołaj Kopernik; gml, Niklas Koppernigk, german: Nikolaus Kopernikus; 19 February 1473 – 24 May 1543) was a Renaissance polymath, active as a mathematician, astronomer, and Catholic canon, who formulated ...
. Galileo spent many years in medical school and often questioned everything his professors taught. He found that the professors could not prove what they taught so he moved onto mathematics where everything had to be proven. Then, at the age of 25, he went to Pisa and taught mathematics. He was a very good lecturer and students would leave their other instructors to hear him speak, so he was forced to resign. He then became a professor at an even more prestigious school in
Padua
Padua ( ; it, Padova ; vec, Pàdova) is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the ...
. His spirit and teachings would lead the world once again in the direction of science. Over his years of science, Galileo made a lot of biomechanical aspects known. For example, he discovered that "animals' masses increase disproportionately to their size, and their bones must consequently also disproportionately increase in girth, adapting to loadbearing rather than mere size. The bending strength of a tubular structure such as a bone is increased relative to its weight by making it hollow and increasing its diameter. Marine animals can be larger than terrestrial animals because the water's buoyancy relieves their tissues of weight."
Galileo Galilei
Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642) was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a polymath. Commonly referred to as Galileo, his name was pronounced (, ). He was ...
was interested in the strength of bones and suggested that bones are hollow because this affords maximum strength with minimum weight. He noted that animals' bone masses increased disproportionately to their size. Consequently, bones must also increase disproportionately in girth rather than mere size. This is because the bending strength of a tubular structure (such as a bone) is much more efficient relative to its weight. Mason suggests that this insight was one of the first grasps of the principles of
biological optimization.
In the 17th century,
Descartes suggested a philosophic system whereby all living systems, including the human body (but not the soul), are simply machines ruled by the same mechanical laws, an idea that did much to promote and sustain biomechanical study.
Industrial era
The next major bio-mechanic,
Giovanni Alfonso Borelli
Giovanni Alfonso Borelli (; 28 January 1608 – 31 December 1679) was a Renaissance Italian physiologist, physicist, and mathematician. He contributed to the modern principle of scientific investigation by continuing Galileo's practice of testin ...
, embraced Descartes' mechanical philosophy and studied walking, running, jumping, the flight of birds, the swimming of fish, and even the piston action of the heart within a mechanical framework. He could determine the position of the human
center of gravity
In physics, the center of mass of a distribution of mass in space (sometimes referred to as the balance point) is the unique point where the weight function, weighted relative position (vector), position of the distributed mass sums to zero. Thi ...
, calculate and measure inspired and expired air volumes, and he showed that inspiration is muscle-driven and expiration is due to tissue elasticity.
Borelli was the first to understand that "the levers of the musculature system magnify motion rather than force, so that muscles must produce much larger forces than those resisting the motion".
Influenced by the work of Galileo, whom he personally knew, he had an intuitive understanding of static equilibrium in various joints of the human body well before
Newton published the laws of motion.
His work is often considered the most important in the history of bio-mechanics because he made so many new discoveries that opened the way for the future generations to continue his work and studies.
It was many years after Borelli before the field of bio-mechanics made any major leaps. After that time, more and more scientists took to learning about the human body and its functions. There are not many notable scientists from the 19th or 20th century in bio-mechanics because the field is far too vast now to attribute one thing to one person. However, the field is continuing to grow every year and continues to make advances in discovering more about the human body. Because the field became so popular, many institutions and labs have opened over the last century and people continue doing research. With the Creation of the American Society of Bio-mechanics in 1977, the field continues to grow and make many new discoveries.
In the 19th century
Étienne-Jules Marey
Étienne-Jules Marey (; 5 March 1830, Beaune, Côte-d'Or – 15 May 1904, Paris) was a French scientist, physiologist and chronophotographer.
His work was significant in the development of cardiology, physical instrumentation, aviation, cinema ...
used
cinematography
Cinematography (from ancient Greek κίνημα, ''kìnema'' "movement" and γράφειν, ''gràphein'' "to write") is the art of motion picture (and more recently, electronic video camera) photography.
Cinematographers use a lens to focu ...
to scientifically investigate
locomotion
Locomotion means the act or ability of something to transport or move itself from place to place.
Locomotion may refer to:
Motion
* Motion (physics)
* Robot locomotion, of man-made devices
By environment
* Aquatic locomotion
* Flight
* Locomo ...
. He opened the field of modern 'motion analysis' by being the first to correlate ground reaction forces with movement. In Germany, the brothers
Ernst Heinrich Weber and
Wilhelm Eduard Weber
Wilhelm Eduard Weber (; ; 24 October 1804 – 23 June 1891) was a German physicist and, together with Carl Friedrich Gauss, inventor of the first electromagnetic telegraph.
Biography of Wilhelm
Early years
Weber was born in Schlossstrasse in ...
hypothesized a great deal about human gait, but it was
Christian Wilhelm Braune
Christian Wilhelm Braune (17 July 1831 Leipzig – 29 April 1892) was a German anatomist. He is known for his excellent lithographs of cross-sections of the human body, and his pioneer work in biomechanics. He also pioneered the use of frozen cad ...
who significantly advanced the science using recent advances in engineering mechanics. During the same period, the engineering
mechanics of materials began to flourish in France and Germany under the demands of the
industrial revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
. This led to the rebirth of bone biomechanics when the
railroad engineer
A train driver, engine driver, engineman or locomotive driver, commonly known as an engineer or railroad engineer in the United States and Canada, and also as a locomotive handler, locomotive operator, train operator, or motorman, is a pers ...
Karl Culmann
Carl Culmann (10 July 1821 – 9 December 1881) was a German structural engineer.
Born in Bad Bergzabern, Rhenish Palatinate, in modern-day Germany, Culmann's father, a pastor, tutored him at home before enrolling him at the military engineerin ...
and the anatomist
Hermann von Meyer
Christian Erich Hermann von Meyer (3 September 1801 – 2 April 1869), known as Hermann von Meyer, was a German palaeontologist. He was awarded the 1858 Wollaston medal by the Geological Society of London.
Life
He was born at Frankfurt am Ma ...
compared the stress patterns in a human femur with those in a similarly shaped crane. Inspired by this finding
Julius Wolff proposed the famous
Wolff's law
Wolff's law, developed by the German anatomist and surgeon Julius Wolff (1836–1902) in the 19th century, states that bone in a healthy animal will adapt to the loads under which it is placed. If loading on a particular bone increases, the bon ...
of
bone remodeling
Bone remodeling (or bone metabolism) is a lifelong process where mature bone tissue is removed from the skeleton (a process called ''bone resorption'') and new bone tissue is formed (a process called ''ossification'' or ''new bone formation''). ...
.
Applications
The study of biomechanics ranges from the inner workings of a cell to the movement and development of
limbs, to the mechanical properties of
soft tissue
Soft tissue is all the tissue in the body that is not hardened by the processes of ossification or calcification such as bones and teeth. Soft tissue connects, surrounds or supports internal organs and bones, and includes muscle, tendons, ligam ...
,
and
bone
A bone is a Stiffness, rigid Organ (biology), organ that constitutes part of the skeleton in most vertebrate animals. Bones protect the various other organs of the body, produce red blood cell, red and white blood cells, store minerals, provid ...
s. Some simple examples of biomechanics research include the investigation of the forces that act on limbs, the
aerodynamics
Aerodynamics, from grc, ἀήρ ''aero'' (air) + grc, δυναμική (dynamics), is the study of the motion of air, particularly when affected by a solid object, such as an airplane wing. It involves topics covered in the field of fluid dyn ...
of
bird
Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...
and
insect
Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs ...
flight
Flight or flying is the process by which an object moves through a space without contacting any planetary surface, either within an atmosphere (i.e. air flight or aviation) or through the vacuum of outer space (i.e. spaceflight). This can be a ...
, the
hydrodynamics
In physics and engineering, fluid dynamics is a subdiscipline of fluid mechanics that describes the flow of fluids—liquids and gases. It has several subdisciplines, including ''aerodynamics'' (the study of air and other gases in motion) and ...
of
swimming
Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, or other liquid, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Locomotion is achieved through coordinated movement of the limbs and the body to achieve hydrodynamic thrust that r ...
in
fish
Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of li ...
, and
locomotion
Locomotion means the act or ability of something to transport or move itself from place to place.
Locomotion may refer to:
Motion
* Motion (physics)
* Robot locomotion, of man-made devices
By environment
* Aquatic locomotion
* Flight
* Locomo ...
in general across all forms of life, from individual cells to whole
organism
In biology, an organism () is any living system that functions as an individual entity. All organisms are composed of cells (cell theory). Organisms are classified by taxonomy into groups such as multicellular animals, plants, and ...
s. With growing understanding of the physiological behavior of living tissues, researchers are able to advance the field of
tissue engineering
Tissue engineering is a biomedical engineering discipline that uses a combination of Cell (biology), cells, engineering, Materials science, materials methods, and suitable biochemistry, biochemical and physicochemical factors to restore, maintai ...
, as well as develop improved treatments for a wide array of
pathologies
Pathology is the study of the causes and effects of disease or injury. The word ''pathology'' also refers to the study of disease in general, incorporating a wide range of biology research fields and medical practices. However, when used in ...
including cancer.
Biomechanics is also applied to studying human musculoskeletal systems. Such research utilizes force platforms to study human ground reaction forces and infrared videography to
capture the trajectories of markers attached to the human body to study human 3D motion. Research also applies
electromyography
Electromyography (EMG) is a technique for evaluating and recording the electrical activity produced by skeletal muscles. EMG is performed using an instrument called an electromyograph to produce a record called an electromyogram. An electromyog ...
to study muscle activation, investigating muscle responses to external forces and perturbations.
Biomechanics is widely used in orthopedic industry to design orthopedic implants for human joints, dental parts, external fixations and other medical purposes. Biotribology is a very important part of it. It is a study of the performance and function of biomaterials used for orthopedic implants. It plays a vital role to improve the design and produce successful biomaterials for medical and clinical purposes. One such example is in tissue engineered cartilage.
The dynamic loading of joints considered as impact is discussed in detail by Emanuel Willert.
It is also tied to the field of
engineering
Engineering is the use of scientific method, scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad rang ...
, because it often uses traditional engineering sciences to analyze
biological systems. Some simple applications of
Newtonian mechanics
Newton's laws of motion are three basic laws of classical mechanics that describe the relationship between the motion of an object and the forces acting on it. These laws can be paraphrased as follows:
# A body remains at rest, or in motion ...
and/or
materials sciences can supply correct approximations to the mechanics of many
biological systems. Applied mechanics, most notably
mechanical engineering
Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, and ...
disciplines such as
continuum mechanics
Continuum mechanics is a branch of mechanics that deals with the mechanical behavior of materials modeled as a continuous mass rather than as discrete particles. The French mathematician Augustin-Louis Cauchy was the first to formulate such m ...
,
mechanism
Mechanism may refer to:
* Mechanism (engineering), rigid bodies connected by joints in order to accomplish a desired force and/or motion transmission
*Mechanism (biology), explaining how a feature is created
*Mechanism (philosophy), a theory that ...
analysis,
structural
A structure is an arrangement and organization of interrelated elements in a material object or system, or the object or system so organized. Material structures include man-made objects such as buildings and machines and natural objects such ...
analysis,
kinematics
Kinematics is a subfield of physics, developed in classical mechanics, that describes the Motion (physics), motion of points, Physical object, bodies (objects), and systems of bodies (groups of objects) without considering the forces that cause ...
and
dynamics play prominent roles in the study of biomechanics.
Usually biological systems are much more complex than man-built systems.
Numerical methods
Numerical analysis is the study of algorithms that use numerical approximation (as opposed to symbolic manipulations) for the problems of mathematical analysis (as distinguished from discrete mathematics). It is the study of numerical methods th ...
are hence applied in almost every biomechanical study. Research is done in an iterative process of hypothesis and verification, including several steps of
modeling
A model is an informative representation of an object, person or system. The term originally denoted the plans of a building in late 16th-century English, and derived via French and Italian ultimately from Latin ''modulus'', a measure.
Models c ...
,
computer simulation
Computer simulation is the process of mathematical modelling, performed on a computer, which is designed to predict the behaviour of, or the outcome of, a real-world or physical system. The reliability of some mathematical models can be dete ...
and
experimental measurements.
See also
*
Biomechatronics
Biomechatronics is an applied interdisciplinary science that aims to integrate biology and mechatronics (electrical, electronics, and mechanical engineering). It also encompasses the fields of robotics and neuroscience. Biomechatronic devices encom ...
*
Biomedical engineering
Biomedical engineering (BME) or medical engineering is the application of engineering principles and design concepts to medicine and biology for healthcare purposes (e.g., diagnostic or therapeutic). BME is also traditionally logical sciences ...
*
Cardiovascular System Dynamics Society The Cardiovascular System Dynamics Society (CSDS), founded on 5 October 1976 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, by organ system physiologist and biomedical engineers, was a historic first in its mathematical and quantitative approach to cardiovascular m ...
*
Evolutionary physiology
Evolutionary physiology is the study of the biological evolution of physiological structures and processes; that is, the manner in which the functional characteristics of individuals in a population of organisms have responded to natural selectio ...
*
Forensic biomechanics Forensic biomechanics is the application of biomechanical engineering science to litigation where biomechanical experts determine whether an accident was the cause of an alleged injury. ''(See "New York State Bar Association Bar Journal Novembe ...
*
International Society of Biomechanics
The International Society of Biomechanics, commonly known as the ISB, is a society dedicated to promoting biomechanics in its various forms. It promotes the study of all areas of biomechanics at the international level, although special emphasis i ...
*
List of biofluid mechanics research groups
This list of biofluid mechanics research groups gives an overview of academic research organisations in the field.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:List Of Biofluid Mechanics Research Groups
*
Research groups ...
*
Mechanics of human sexuality
Mechanics (from Ancient Greek: μηχανική, ''mēkhanikḗ'', "of machines") is the area of mathematics and physics concerned with the relationships between force, matter, and motion among physical objects. Forces applied to objects ...
*
OpenSim (simulation toolkit)
OpenSim is an open source software system for biomechanical modeling, simulation and analysis. Its purpose is to provide free and widely accessible tools for conducting biomechanics research and motor control science. OpenSim enables a wide rang ...
*
Physical oncology Physical oncology (PO) is defined as the study of the role of mechanical signals in a cancerous tumor. The mechanical signals can be forces, pressures ("pull", "push" and "shear" designating the forces / pressures that push, pull or are tangential). ...
References
Further reading
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External links
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Biomechanics and Movement Science Listserver (Biomch-L)
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Motor control