| Abstract | The project was focused on investigating sRPAS to human head impact safety. A finite element (FE) model of a representative quadcopter sRPAS was developed. The FE sRPAS model impacted average adult male model and head kinematics data were predicted. The model predictions were validated against cadaveric data.
Based on validated computational simulations, various injury metrics including HIC (head injury criteria), BrIC (brain injury criteria), peak head linear accelerations, and peak rotational velocity were analyzed. A strong correlation between HIC15 and peak linear acceleration was observed. Also, BrIC strongly correlated with peak rotational velocity. Minimizing the structural effect of the quadcopter sRPAS, HIC15 was found to positively correlate with skull stresses. BrIC was found to be moderately correlated with brain strains evaluated using cumulative strain damage measure (CSDM).
Sensitivity analysis on impact location and impact angle revealed that head kinematics would be affected by slight changes of impact location and impact angle.
Head kinematics, HIC, BrIC, skull stress, and brain strain were compared between average male and small female using computational simulations. Small female head experienced almost twice of HIC and 40% more BrIC as average female head experienced. |
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