Since World War I, helmets have been used to protect the head in warfare, designed primarily for protection against artillery shrapnel. More recently, helmet requirements have included ballistic and blunt trauma protection, but neurotrauma from primary blast has never been a key concern in helmet design. Only in recent years has the threat of direct blast wave impingement on the head-separate from penetrating trauma-been appreciated. This study compares the blast protective effect of historical (World War I) and current combat helmets, against each other and 'no helmet' or bare head, for realistic shock wave impingement on the helmet crown. Helmets included World War I variants from the United Kingdom/United States (Brodie), France (Adrian), Germany (Stahlhelm), and a current United States combat variant (Advanced Combat Helmet). Helmets were mounted on a dummy head and neck and aligned along the crown of the head with a cylindrical shock tube to simulate an overhead blast. Primary blast waves of different magnitudes were generated based on estimated blast conditions from historical shells. Peak reflected overpressure at the open end of the blast tube was compared to peak overpressure measured at several head locations. All helmets provided significant pressure attenuation compared to the no helmet case. The modern variant did not provide more pressure attenuation than the historical helmets, and some historical helmets performed better at certain measurement locations. The study demonstrates that both historical and current helmets have some primary blast protective capabilities, and that simple design features may improve these capabilities for future helmet systems.
Currently, no scientific consensus exists on the relative safety of catcher mask styles and materials. Due to differences in mass and material properties, the style and material of a catcher mask influences the impact metrics observed during simulated foul ball impacts. The catcher surrogate was a Hybrid III head and neck equipped with a six degree of freedom sensor package to obtain linear accelerations and angular rates. Four mask styles were impacted using an air cannon for six 30 m/s and six 35 m/s impacts to the nasion. To quantify impact severity, the metrics peak linear acceleration, peak angular acceleration, Head Injury Criterion, Head Impact Power, and Gadd Severity Index were used. An Analysis of Covariance and a Tukey’s HSD Test were conducted to compare the least squares mean between masks for each head injury metric. For each injury metric a P-Value less than 0.05 was found indicating a significant difference in mask performance. Tukey’s HSD test found for each metric, the traditional style titanium mask fell in the lowest performance category while the hockey style mask was in the highest performance category. Limitations of this study prevented a direct correlation from mask testing performance to mild traumatic brain injury.
Currently, no scientific consensus exists on the relative safety of catcher mask styles and materials. Due to differences in mass and material properties, the style and material of a catcher mask influences the impact metrics observed during simulated foul ball impacts. The catcher surrogate was a Hybrid III head and neck equipped with a six degree of freedom sensor package to obtain linear accelerations and angular rates. Four mask styles were impacted using an air cannon for six 30 m/s and six 35 m/s impacts to the nasion. To quantify impact severity, the metrics peak linear acceleration, peak angular acceleration, Head Injury Criterion, Head Impact Power, and Gadd Severity Index were used. An Analysis of Covariance and a Tukey's HSD Test were conducted to compare the least squares mean between masks for each head injury metric. For each injury metric a P-Value less than 0.05 was found indicating a significant difference in mask performance. Tukey's HSD test found for each metric, the traditional style titanium mask fell in the lowest performance category while the hockey style mask was in the highest performance category. Limitations of this study prevented a direct correlation from mask testing performance to mild traumatic brain injury.
Cavitation has been shown to have implications for head injury, but currently there is no solution for detecting the formation of cavitation through the skull during blunt impact. The goal of this communication is to confirm the wideband acoustic wavelet signature of cavitation collapse, and determine that this signature can be differentiated from the noise of a blunt impact. A controlled, laser induced cavitation study was conducted in an isolated water tank to confirm the wide band acoustic signature of cavitation collapse in the absence of a blunt impact. A clear acrylic surrogate head was impacted to induce blunt impact cavitation. The bubble formation was imaged using a high speed camera, and the collapse was synched up with the wavelet transform of the acoustic emission. Wideband acoustic response is seen in wavelet transform of positive laser induced cavitation tests, but absent in laser induced negative controls. Clear acrylic surrogate tests showed the wideband acoustic wavelet signature of collapse can be differentiated from acoustic noise generated by a blunt impact. Broadband acoustic signal can be used as a biomarker to detect the incidence of cavitation through the skull as it consists of frequencies that are low enough to potentially pass through the skull but high enough to differentiate from blunt impact noise. This lays the foundation for a vital tool to conduct CSF cavitation research in-vivo.
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