Computational biomechanics to track bone vascular health and fracture risk.

骨骼通过改变其整体几何结构、微结构和组织属性(如矿化度)来适应机械负荷。这些功能性骨骼适应与骨骼的血管健康密切相关，保持整体骨骼强度和抗骨折能力。在与年龄相关的骨折风险方面，男性和女性之间存在公认的差异。众所周知，苛刻的运动方案会损害包括运动员在内的女性的骨骼健康。此外，据报道，在年轻的活跃个人中存在骨折风险的性别二型性，据报道，在军事训练期间，女性的下肢骨折发生率是男性的3倍。这个博士生项目将利用最先进的成像技术和有限元模型来评估军队和运动员在进行极限运动后的骨骼微结构和功能。该项目在南安普顿大学工程与物理科学学院和环境与生命科学学院的共同支持下，在工程、生命科学和生物医学接口方面提供了一个独特的跨学科课程。学生将直接与生物科学学院和UVIS X射线成像中心的研究人员合作，同时受益于获得尖端生物成像技术、计算工程方法方面的专业知识，以及我们基于工程和生物医学专业知识为改善生活而做出的翻译努力。

Bone adapts to mechanical loads by changing its overall geometry, microstructure and tissue properties such as degree of mineralisation. These functional bone adaptations are closely coupled to the bones' vascular health, maintaining overall bone strength and fracture resistance. There is an acknowledged divergence in age-related bone fracture risk between men and women. Demanding exercise regimes are known to compromise bone health in women including athletes. Further, sexual dimorphism in fracture risk has been reported in young active individuals, with lower limb fracture occurrence reported to be 3-fold higher in women than men during military training. This PhD studentship will utilise state-of-the-art imaging techniques and finite element modelling to assess bone microstructure and function following extreme exercise regimes used within the military and by athletes. This project offers a unique interdisciplinary programme at the engineering, life science, and biomedical interface with shared support from the Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences and the Faculty of the Environment and Life Sciences at the University of Southampton. The student will directly collaborate with researchers at the School of Biological Sciences and u-VIS X-ray Imaging Centre, while benefiting from the exceptional opportunity to gain expertise in cutting-edge bioimaging technologies, computational engineering approaches and our translational efforts to change the life for the better, based on engineering and biomedical expertise.