Response Analysis of Passive Human Knee Joint in Flexion Under Anterior-Posterior Loads

The human knee joint is a multi-body complex system that experiences relatively large loads and displacements during normal daily activities. The joint stability is provided by its articular surfaces, menisci, ligaments and muscles. An injury to a component is expected to influence the joint normal kinematics/kinetics with liklihood to initiate/accelerate joint instability and degeneration. In this work, a validated nonlinear 3-D model of the human knee joint [1,2] is further refined and applied to the analysis of the tibiofemoral joint in passive flexion under 100N anterior or posterior horizontal preload. Attention is focused on the global (primary and coupled) motions, ligament forces and load transmission via articular surfaces. The effect of ligament initial strain on the response is also investigated.