Determination of the strain response of sheep femur, based on quasistatic walking experiments.

The creep strain of fresh femoral sheep bones was measured in the time interval between 10(-2) to 10(+3) sec, when the bones were under compression load of full body weight. The stress developed during walking in the femur was expressed by a step function. A rheological model with three parameters was used to calculate the strain response. The mean features of the calculated strain response of the femur during walking, were the transient phenomena in the beginning of walking and the permanent strain in the steady state. The possible biological and clinical perspectives of this behaviour of the femur are discussed.