Biodynamic Research Corporation (United States)

Study Design.This study combined all prior research involving human volunteers in low-speed rear-end impacts and performed a comparative analysis of real-world crashes using the National Automotive Sampling System – Crashworthiness Data System.Objective.The aim of this study was to assess the rates of neck pain between volunteer and real-world collisions as well as the likelihood of an injury beyond symptoms as a function of impact severity and occupant characteristics in real-world collisions.Summary of Background Data.A total of 51 human volunteer studies were identified that produced a dataset of 1984 volunteer impacts along with a separate dataset of 515,601 weighted occupants in real-world rear impacts.Methods.Operating-characteristic curves were created to assess the utility of the volunteer dataset in making predictions regarding the overall population. Change in speed or delta-V was used to model the likelihood of reporting symptoms in both real-world and volunteer exposures and more severe injuries using real-world data. Logistic regression models were created for the volunteer data and survey techniques were used to analyze the weighted sampling scheme with the National Automotive Sampling System database.Results.Symptom reporting rates were not different between males and females and were nearly identical between laboratory and real-world exposures. The minimal risk of injury predicted by real-world exposure is consistent with the statistical power of the large number of volunteer studies without any injury beyond the reporting of neck pain.Conclusion.This study shows that volunteer studies do not under-report symptoms and are sufficient in number to conclude that the risk of injury beyond neck strain under similar conditions is essentially zero. The real-world injury analyses demonstrate that rear impacts do not produce meaningful risks of cervical injury at impacts of similar and greater severity to those of the volunteer research. Future work concerning the mechanism of whiplash-related trauma should focus on impacts of severity greater than those in the current literature.Level of Evidence: 3

A series of tip-over and off-the-dock impact tests were performed with stand-up forklifts to investigate the potential for injury to the operator of a forklift in these types of accidents, when the forklift is equipped with an operator’s compartment door. One Crown Equipment Company 35RRTT Model and one 35RCTT Model stand-up forklifts were used in the impact tests. The only modification to the forklifts for the tests was the placement of a door on the entrance to the operator’s compartment. A Hybrid III anthropomorphic test device (ATD) was placed in the operator’s compartment as a human surrogate. During each test, head accelerations, chest accelerations, neck loads, and lumbar loads were measured on the ATD. The motion of the forklift and the ATD were filmed with real-time video and high-speed cameras. Results from the impact tests indicate that there is a high risk of head injury in a right-side tip-over accident and a high risk of head injury and neck injury in a left-side tip-over accident. There is a high risk of a head injury, neck injury, and thoracic injury in off-the-dock forks-trailing accidents. In an off-the-dock forks-leading accident, there is a high risk of arm/shoulder injury, head injury, and neck injury. In both tip-over and off-the-dock forks-trailing accidents, there is a high probability of an entrapment injury under the overhead guard on the forklift.

Neck muscle activation is believed to generally protect against whiplash and head injury in automotive impacts and sports activities. When the torso is struck, active tensing of the neck muscles may prevent the neck from rotating excessively due to the inertia of the head. In this scenario, neck muscle tension may also reduce the severity of a secondary head impact occurring after the primary impact with the body. In a direct impact to the head, it has been hypothesized that active neck muscle tension may reduce the acceleration experienced by the head by increasing its effective mass.

The National Science Foundation of the United States has funded a four-year project to develop genomic tools for the Fagaceae, the beech family, which includes chestnut (Castanea), oak (Quercus), and beech (Fagus). A large amount of cDNA sequence of Castanea, Quercus, and Fagus is being generated by pyrosequencing, a new technique that can produce large amounts of DNA sequence at a lower cost per nucleotide than conventional Sanger-Coulson sequencing. New molecular markers, primarily Single-Nucleotide Polymorphisms, are being discovered, and three Bacterial Artificial Chromosome Libraries of Castanea mollissima cv. 'Vanuxem' have been generated and are available for purchase at the Clemson University Genomics Institute. All sequence information generated by the project will be available on-line at www.fagaceae.org.