Mathematical and Computational Applications Article The Strain Rates in the Brain, Brainstem, Dura, and Skull under Dynamic Loadings Mohammad Hosseini-Farid 1,2,* , MaryamSadat Amiri-Tehrani-Zadeh 3, Mohammadreza Ramzanpour 1, Mariusz Ziejewski 1 and Ghodrat Karami 1 1 Department of Mechanical Engineering, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58104, USA;
[email protected] (M.R.);
[email protected] (M.Z.);
[email protected] (G.K.) 2 Department of Orthopedic Surgery, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN 55905, USA 3 Department of Computer Science, North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND 58104, USA;
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[email protected]; Tel.: +1-7012315859 Received: 7 March 2020; Accepted: 5 April 2020; Published: 7 April 2020 Abstract: Knowing the precise material properties of intracranial head organs is crucial for studying the biomechanics of head injury. It has been shown that these biological tissues are significantly rate-dependent; hence, their material properties should be determined with respect to the range of deformation rate they experience. In this paper, a validated finite element human head model is used to investigate the biomechanics of the head in impact and blast, leading to traumatic brain injuries (TBI). We simulate the head under various directions and velocities of impacts, as well as helmeted and unhelmeted head under blast shock waves. It is demonstrated that the strain rates for the brain 1 are in the range of 36 to 241 s− , approximately 1.9 and 0.86 times the resulting head acceleration under impacts and blast scenarios, respectively. The skull was found to experience a rate in the range 1 of 14 to 182 s− , approximately 0.7 and 0.43 times the head acceleration corresponding to impact and blast cases.