title: Implantable microelectromechanical sensors for diagnostic monitoring and post-surgical prediction of bone fracture healing.
abstract: The relationship between modern clinical diagnostic data, such as from radiographs or computed tomography, and the temporal biomechanical integrity of bone fracture healing has not been well-established. A diagnostic tool that could quantitatively describe the biomechanical stability of the fracture site in order to predict the course of healing would represent a paradigm shift in the way fracture healing is evaluated. This paper describes the development and evaluation of a wireless, biocompatible, implantable, microelectromechanical system (bioMEMS) sensor, and its implementation in a large animal (ovine) model, that utilized both normal and delayed healing variants. The in vivo data indicated that the bioMEMS sensor was capable of detecting statistically significant differences (p-value <0.04) between the two fracture healing groups as early as 21 days post-fracture. In addition, post-sacrifice micro-computed tomography, and histology data demonstrated that the two model variants represented significantly different fracture healing outcomes, providing explicit supporting evidence that the sensor has the ability to predict differential healing cascades. These data verify that the bioMEMS sensor can be used as a diagnostic tool for detecting the in vivo course of fracture healing in the acute post-treatment period.
authors.affiliation: Orthopaedic Bioengineering Research Laboratory, Departments of Mechanical Engineering and School of Biomedical Engineering, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, 80523.
authors.forename: Kirk C
authors.initials: KC
authors.lastname: McGilvray
authors.affiliation: Departments of Electrical and Electronics Engineering and Physics, UNAM-Institute of Materials Science and Nanotechnology, Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Emre
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Unal
authors.affiliation: Orthopaedic Bioengineering Research Laboratory, Departments of Mechanical Engineering and School of Biomedical Engineering, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, 80523.
authors.forename: Kevin L
authors.initials: KL
authors.lastname: Troyer
authors.affiliation: Orthopaedic Bioengineering Research Laboratory, Departments of Mechanical Engineering and School of Biomedical Engineering, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, 80523.
authors.forename: Brandon G
authors.initials: BG
authors.lastname: Santoni
authors.affiliation: Preclinical Surgical Research Laboratory, Department of Clinical Sciences, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, 80523.
authors.forename: Ross H
authors.initials: RH
authors.lastname: Palmer
authors.affiliation: Preclinical Surgical Research Laboratory, Department of Clinical Sciences, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, 80523.
authors.forename: Jeremiah T
authors.initials: JT
authors.lastname: Easley
authors.affiliation: Departments of Electrical and Electronics Engineering and Physics, UNAM-Institute of Materials Science and Nanotechnology, Bilkent University, Ankara, Turkey.|School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering and School of Physical and Mathematical Science, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
authors.forename: Hilmi Volkan
authors.initials: HV
authors.lastname: Demir
authors.affiliation: Orthopaedic Bioengineering Research Laboratory, Departments of Mechanical Engineering and School of Biomedical Engineering, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, 80523.
authors.forename: Christian M
authors.initials: CM
authors.lastname: Puttlitz
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D004567:Electrodes, Implanted; D017102:Fracture Healing; D008422:Materials Testing; D055617:Micro-Electrical-Mechanical Systems; D018670:Monitoring, Ambulatory / Q000295:instrumentation*; D012756:Sheep; D013686:Telemetry / Q000295:instrumentation*
keywords: biomechanics; fracture healing; histology; micro computed tomography; microelectromechanical system (MEMS)