Measurement of the microstructural fracture toughness of cortical bone using indentation fracture

Abstract The purpose of this work is to investigate the use of indentation fracture as a method of measuring toughness at the microscale in cortical bone. Indentation fracture employs sharp indenters to initiate cracks, whose length can be used to calculate the toughness of the material. Only a cube corner indenter tip is found to initiate cracks at a suitable size scale for microstructural measurement. Cracks from 7 to 56 μm in length are produced using loads from 0.05 to 3 N. Preliminary data predicts rising toughness with increasing crack length (rising R-curve behaviour) at the microscale. This technique provides a new insight into fracture in cortical bone since it allows the investigator to observe mechanisms and measure toughness at a size scale at which in vivo damage is known to exist.