Wearable head impact sensors for estimation of brain strain

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The overarching objective of this work is to investigate the capacity of a wearable helmet instrumentation system, designed to measure linear and angular head kinematics and the severity of head impact, to accurately predict brain strain magnitudes using currently available numerical models of the head-brain. These numerical models and their associated suite of strain-based mechanical predictors of brain injury have recently been advanced as tools to assess risk of brain injury in both sport and automotive accidents. The strain metrics have, in some cases, shown excellent capacity to predict diffuse brain injury (including concussion) likelihood and as a result are increasingly being applied to study the mechanics of head injury in professional sports including hockey and football. For these models to predict strain, they require as inputs linear and angular head kinematics. The current state-of-the-art in determining athlete head kinematics is to use in-situ (wearable) sensors, fixed to the athlete's protective headgear. The capacity of these sensors to measure kinematic magnitudes has been studied extensively. To date, there is no research assessing the capacity of these sensors to give accurate (relative to laboratory methods) predictions of brain strain.