Automatic CT-based finite element model generation for temperature-based death time estimation: feasibility study and sensitivity analysis.

Temperature-based death time estimation is based either on simple phenomenological models of corpse cooling or on detailed physical heat transfer models. The latter are much more complex but allow a higher accuracy of death time estimation, as in principle, all relevant cooling mechanisms can be taken into account.Here, a complete workflow for finite element-based cooling simulation is presented.

Micromechanics-based conversion of CT data into anisotropic elasticity tensors, applied to FE simulations of a mandible.

Computer Tomographic (CT) image data have become a standard basis for structural analyses of bony organs. In this context, regression functions between stiffness components and Hounsfields units (HU) from CT, related to X-ray attenuation coefficients, are widely used for the definition of the (actually inhomogeneous and anisotropic) material behavior inside the organ. Herein, we suggest to derive the functional dependence of the fully orthotropic stiffness tensors on the Hounsfield units from the physical information contained in the X-ray attenuation coefficients: (i) Based on voxel average rules for the X-ray attenuation coefficients, we assign to each voxel the volume fraction occupied by water (marrow) and that occupied by solid bone matrix.