Experimental and finite element analyses of bone strains in the growing rat tibia induced by in vivo axial compression

The objective of this study was to develop and validate a voxel based FE modeling approach to investigate bone strains from in vivo rat tibial compression during the adolescent period. To do so, in vivo strain gauge measurements and voxel based FE modeling derived from micro-CT scanning were combined for rat tibiae aged 4, 8 and 12 week old, respectively corresponding to the beginning of pubertal, mid-pubertal and end of the pubertal period. Bone structural parameters, effects of varying strain gauge locations and strains in different directions of the tibiae were also investigated.