Simulation of flow across cancellous bone cubes to determine permeability

Abstract

There are many technical difficulties when conducting direct permeation experiments to determine the permeability of cancellous bone. This attributed to the large range of results obtained in previous experimental investigations. In this study, we propose using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to overcome these difficulties. Our CFD models for the flow simulation across cancellous bone specimen were generated from micro-computed tomography image datasets. We studied the effects of dataset resolution on the results of CFD and have recommended a resolution no greater than 77.92microns. The possible visualizations of flow across microarchitecture are also presented. The permeability factor obtained in this study is within the wide range obtained from literature.