Background

By age 80, over 80% of adults have a degenerated disc.

Nucleus replacement as a treatment for degenerative disc disease (DDD) is relatively new and still being researched. Due to this, there are minimal devices to characterize a nucleus replacement device that proves to be efficient and accurate on a patient-to-patient basis. To create a testing procedure that is increasingly more standardized, we have built a test fixture that adheres to the ASTM-F2789-10 standard for lifting force and swelling. 

Our senior design group worked alongside SeaSpine to help design a test fixture for nucleus replacement devices. We designed a test fixture that adheres to ASTM F2789-10 standards, which is the Functional and Mechanical Characterization of Nucleus Replacement Devices. By creating a test fixture, this would hopefully increase the amount of research and engineering done for nucleus replacement devices.