Inadequate bone stock is often found in revision surgery of femoral components of total knee replacements. Our aim was to test the hypothesis that these remodelling patterns can be explained by stress shielding, and that prosthetic bonding characteristics affect maintenance of bone mass. We made a three-dimensional finite-element model of an average male femur with a cemented femoral knee compo...

In this review I report evidence that the mainstream field of oxidative damage biology has been running fast in the wrong direction for more than 50 years. Reactive oxygen species (ROS) and chronic oxidative changes in membrane lipids and proteins found in many chronic diseases are not the result of accidental damage. Instead, these changes are the result of a highly evolved, stereotyped, and p...

A simple damage evolution model is proposed for a quasibrittle material in the framework of continuum damage mechanics. The model is used to obtain a closed form solution for a mode-III stationary crack under small scale damage conditions. It is found that the crack tip stress intensity factor is reduced, i.e., the crack is shielded by the damage. However, this shielding effect is completely of...

Engineering strategies to counter occupational heat stress usually involve reducing the environmental heat load (through shielding, refrigeration and increased air flow) to facilitate heat dissipation from the human body, and/or improved mechanization to minimize high metabolic rates. In the South African mining industry, technological and economic constraints often preclude a purely engineerin...

Finite element analysis was performed using 3-dimensional models to examine the biomechanical characteristics of the femoral component in resurfacing hip arthroplasty. Stress concentration was observed in the cortical bone adjacent to the rim of the prosthesis. Stress shielding was observed in the anterosuperior regions on the cancellous bone cross-sections near the cup rim. These biomechanical...

Using finite element analysis, a parametric study was developed to compare stress and strain energy density (SED), in order to determine which stimuli might be better for predicting stress shielding in bone-screw models. Defined stimuli transfer parameters demonstrated that stress and SED (strong candidates for initiating the bone remodeling process) are transferred distinctively between an imp...

Dynamically adjusting the right amount of goal shielding to varying situational demands is associated with the flexibility of cognitive control, typically linked with pFC functioning. Although stress hormones are found to also bind to prefrontal receptors, the link between stress and cognitive control remains elusive. Based on that, we aimed at investigating effects of acute psychosocial stress...