Background
Traumatic brain injury (TBI) has been increasingly recognized for its prevalence among military personnel, often resulting from blast exposures, blunt trauma, and ballistic impacts encountered in combat and training scenarios. The consequences of such injuries are profound, affecting not only the physical health of the service members but also their mental health, cognitive functioning, and quality of life. In recent years, the design and development of military helmets have garnered significant attention, aiming to enhance protection against TBI. Current helmet designs, while effective to a degree, often fall short in providing optimal protection across the spectrum of potential impact velocities. High-velocity impacts (ballistic) require helmets to disperse a significant amount of impact energy caused by projectiles, while low-velocity impacts (blunt) necessitate a softer less stiff structure that can absorb the impact energy caused by a fall or falling object. This project was funded (fully or in-part) by The University of Texas at San Antonio, Office of Research and Southwest Research Institute.
Approach
Video 1: High-speed video of a ballistic impact test. This view is looking upwards into the helmet, where a commercial-off-the-shelf pad is in contact with the forehead of the test dummy.
This project focused on the design, fabrication, and evaluation of impact-resistant materials for the padding within military helmets. The primary aim was to enhance the performance characteristics of these materials against ballistic and blunt impacts. Novel, multi-behavior padding systems were designed using advanced material sciences, computational analysis, and 3D printing technologies. The objective was to create a padding system that dynamically adjusted to high-velocity ballistic impacts and low-velocity blunt impacts, offering optimal energy absorption and enhanced protection. Novel pad samples were subjected to rigorous ballistic and blunt impact tests to evaluate their performance in different scenarios. During those tests, data was recorded with an anthropomorphic test dummy and padding performance was evaluated using metrics such as head accelerations and head injury criteria.
Accomplishments
The fabrication and testing process was iterative, where various pads were evaluated and improved based on their performance results. By the end of the project, the novel helmet pads consistently outperformed existing off-the-shelf pads for both blunt and ballistic impacts. In some cases, the novel pads reduced head accelerations and head injury criteria by up to 75%.