Nitinol, a biocompatible, shape memory alloy capable of large recoverable
strain, have been successfully used in medical implants, such as stent,
filters, guide wires and heart valve frames. 

This seminar offers an introduction to its unique material properties, a brief review of its
typical application, and several case studies on how to use FEA on Nitinol
medical devices.  It shows that FEA can help to predict the device
performance and to help material scientists tailor the material properties
to meet specific design needs.

What you will learn:

Finite Element Analysis (FEA) is widely used as a stress and strain analysis
tool for complicated structures and/or material responses.  Applications of
both Nitinol and FEA in medical device industry have quickly increased in
the past decade.  However, because Nitinol is a unique and relative new
material, analyzing Nitinol via FEA remains challenging.  This training
course is designed to bridge the material knowledge and mechanical analysis
using FEA.  It includes an introduction to the thermo-mechanical properties
of Nitinol, a widely used shape memory alloy in medical implant industry, a
review of the constitutive modeling, use of the available Abaqus
user-defined material subroutines specific to the Nitinol medical implants
such as stents, and several hands-on finite element applications.  You will
learn the thermo-mechanical properties of Nitinol and several case studies
of analyzing its performance via ABAQUS.

Who should attend:

  a.. Mechanical/Design Engineers
  b.. Stress analysts
  c.. Project Managers
  d.. Material Scientists

Time: 10 am PST/1 pm EST for 1.5 hours 
        

The Instructors

Xiao-Yan Gong, Ph.D.

Xiao-Yan Gong received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Properties of Materials from the University of California at Santa Barbara.  Dr. Gong is currently President of Medical Implant Mechanics LLC, addressing the increasing demand for mechanical analysis in the medical device and implant industry.  He served as the group leader on “Fatigue to Fracture and Beyond” for ASTM F04.30.06 Task Group on Medical and Surgical Materials and Devices, Cardiovascular Standards Subcommittee.  Dr. Gong has more than 22 years experience in Finite Element Analysis on both structural and fluid dynamics.  He started working in medical device and implant industry in June 1998 as a Senior Design Analyst for Carbomedics Inc., a prosthesis heart valve manufacturer in Austin, Texas.  Where he worked closely design engineers and from them he recognized the value of numerical analysis in the early stages of product design and made the nonlinear finite element analysis in heart valve design a routine practice in the company.  Prior to establishing Medical Implant Mechanics, Dr. Gong is a Principal Engineer for Nitinol Devices and Components, a Johnson and Johnson Company.  Where he focused on nonlinear Finite Element Analysis on Nitinol, established peripheral stent durability program and conducted Nitinol fatigue research.

Nuno Rebelo, Ph.D.

Nuno Rebelo received his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley in 1980.  For most of his professional life he has been involved in both the software development and in the industrial application of finite element methods.  In the period 1984-2001 he was a member of the development staff of the Marc and the Abaqus general purpose finite element codes. In 1989 he opened and has been the General Manager of what is today the Western Region office of SIMULIA. 

For more than 10 years he has been involved with FE analysis of medical devices and he wrote the Nitinol material model available in Abaqus.