Research on the Impact Resistance of the Periodic Helicoidal Multilayer Bionic Structure Based on Osteon Microstructure

Abstract

Background: As a typical biological material, bone have excellent mechanical properties and plays an important role in supporting the animal body and protecting organs, osteon is an important part of bone. It is found that the osteon is composed of thin and thick lamellae which are periodic and approximately concentric, every 5 lamellae is a cycle, the periodic helix angle of mineralized collagen fibers in two adjacent sub-lamellae is 30°. Four biomimetic composite models with different fiber helix angles were established and fabricated according to the microstructure of mineralized collagen fibers in osteon. Based on the impact analysis of four kinds of bionic composite models, the effects of the fiber periodic helicoidal structure on the impact resistance and energy dissipation of multi-layer bionic composite were investigated. Results: The analysis results show that the fiber helix angle affects the impact damage resistance and energy dissipation of multi-layer fiber reinforced composites. Among the four kinds of multilayer composite models, the composite model with helix angle of 30° has better comprehensive ability to resist impact damage. The test results show that the impact damage area of the specimen with 30° helix angle is smallest among the four types of bionic specimens, which is consistent with the results of finite element impact analysis. Furthermore, in the case of no impact damage, the smaller the fiber helix angle is, the more uniform the stress distribution is and more energy is dissipated in the impact process. Conclusions: The periodic helicoidal structure of mineralized collagen fibers in osteon are the result of natural selection of biological evolution. This structure can effectively improve the ability of cortical bone to resist external impact. The research results can provide useful guidance for the design and manufacture of high-performance and strong impact resistant biomimetic composites.