Engineering your face
Whether because of a break, fracture, tumor, or infection, some people are forced to turn to facial reconstruction surgery. It becomes vital not just to repair the appearance of the face, but to repair its function as well. After all, it controls one’s ability to talk, eat, and swallow.
Using principles of engineering, researchers at the University of Illinois and the Ohio State Medical Center are putting together a new method for the surgery that changes the very way the world sees you.
A popular engineering technique is called topology optimization. Wikipedia states that topology optimization “optimizes material layout within a given design space, and for a given set of loads and boundary conditions such that the resulting structure meets a prescribed set of performance targets.” Such an approach is commonly used to engineer various structures, such as buildings and cars. And now it is being used to engineer the human face.
According to Glaucio Paulino, an engineering professor, “Topology optimization offers an interdisciplinary framework to integrate concepts from medicine, biology, numerical methods, mechanics, and computations.”
The college’s plan was to use bone for facial reconstruction surgery, but since the face is delicate and complex, this is more difficult than it seems. However, borrowing principles and techniques from engineering, researchers created 3-D models and analyzed how to make alterations and adjustments according to injuries.
With the success of modeling bone replacements, researchers are hopeful for future progression.
As Paulino said, “This technique has the potential to pave the way toward development of tissue engineering methods to create custom fabricated living bone replacements in optimum shapes and amounts. The possibilities are immense and we feel that we are just in the beginning of the process.”
So remember, surgeons who are in the field of facial reconstruction must not only have the mind of a doctor; they must also possess the mind of an engineer.
