Material Selection Based on Finite Element Method in Customized Iliac Implant

Abstract

Osteosarcoma, as the most frequent bone tumor cases, can be found in the pelvis bone. Within the pelvis, the ilium is the most common location for osteosarcoma, followed by the acetabulum and then the ischium. Surgery of pelvis is difficult and the reconstruction is complicated mainly due to the geometry complexity and also the weight support function of the pelvis. Endoprosthesis of the ilium is therefore designed to increase the quality of life of the patient. In this study, the iliac implant is designed based on the natural geometry of the ilium, and the size is modified to fit the morphometry of the Eastern Asian. A finite element method (FEM) is proposed as a basic study in material selection. Titanium and its alloy (Ti-6Al-4V) are studied as the potential candidate for the proposed implant while the finite analysis of the bone was also included. As a preliminary study, in this FEM, only the static load is given, each material is assumed to be isotropic and the contacts were considered bonded. FEM in this study is expected to give a better understanding of the stress distribution, and to optimize the selection of materials.