Casts of upper canine teeth of 15 species of microchiropteran bats were fixed securely into a testing machine and made to puncture the bloom side of an apple. The force necessary to break through the surface of the apple was regressed against both shape of the tip of the canine and the size of the animal. Sharper tips require less force to puncture than blunt ones. Results were also verified us...

It is thought that the stress concentration at the root apex caused by orthodontic force induces root resorption. The purpose of this study was to investigate stress distribution at the root in cases of deviated root shapes using finite element models (FEMs). To clarify this, five three-dimensional FEMs divided by deviated root shape (normal, short, blunt, bent root apex, pipette shape) were co...

A closed-form solution is presented for a cantilevered sectorial plate subjected to a tip concentrated force. Since the particular solution for this problem was not found in the literature, it is derived here. Deflections from the total solution (particular plus homogeneous solutions) are compared to those from a finite element analysis and are found to be in excellent agreement, producing an e...

A slim and flexible tactile sensor applicable to the interaction of human and intelligent robots is presented. In particular, a simple sensing principle for decoupling of three-dimensional force is proposed. Sensitivity of the proposed tactile sensor is tested experimentally. To improve the sensitivity of the sensor, a table-shaped sensing element was designed. Table-shaped structure can conver...

The current study analyzed changes in anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) and lateral collateral ligament stress as a result of mechanical varus. In an exploratory pilot study, progressive mechanical varus was introduced to a male finite element model of the lower limb at different knee flexion angles. Nine situations were analyzed (combinations of 0°, 30°, and 60° knee flexion and 0°, 5°, and 10°...