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P5-7. Customised Fixation Plate Design for Surgical Applications

Project leader: Mohammad Saadatfar (Applied Maths, ANU)
Industry partner: Paul Smith, Canberra Orthopaedic Research & Education Foundation
Fig. 1: (a) Additively manufactured pelvic bone, (b) X-ray CT based reconstructed pelvic bone, (c) Selected regions by orthopaedic surgeons to design a fixation plate, (d) generated fixation plate conforming the bone topography and (e) Stress distribution (FE) highlighting stress consecration around the fractured region.
Objective:
  1. Medical implants are often designed for the average bone size and shape. First objective of this project is to device an automated workflow to obtain an optimal and customised design fixation plate for a patient.
  2. 3D imaging technologies coupled with Additive Manufacturing (AM) to capture the status of bone defects and enable the design of a personalised implant with unlimited design freedom.
  3. Test a multiscale imaging, design, manufacturing and testing workflow to build and test optimal personalised implant structures.
Alignment within M3D Innovation:
  1. Development of 3D multiscale imaging and analysis workflow.
  2. Overlap with Defence industry projects.
Approach:
  1. Development of new designs via generative design and topology optimisation (GDTO). Calculation of biomechanical properties on customised designs and comparison to standard methods.
  2. Experimentation and modelling to investigate biomechanics of fractured pelvic bones with and without standardised plate. Analysis of biomechanical properties of bone / plates under realistic loading conditions.
  3. Fabrication of customised plate by AM methods and NDE analysis of resultant structure prepared for implantation. Mechanical testing of the proposed implant mechanical responses from AM printed bone and implant structural tests.
  4. Optimisation of the entire workflow to satisfy the urgent time requirements for treatment.
Key Milestones:
  1. Compatibility of scans obtained by medical CT scanners and data importation into in-house software. [Complete]
  2. Robust image quality tests for accurate fracture identification in clinical settings. [Partially complete]
  3. Development of optimal designs with GDTO. Testing and quality control of model implant responses. [Complete]
  4. AM fabrication and mechanical testing of customised plates. Comparison to standardised plates. [Partially complete]
  5. Biomechanical modelling of the fractured systems with standardised plates. [June 2021]
  6. Surface treatment for bio-compatibility and prevention of biofilms. [June]