Compression rate affects the mechanical response of meniscectomized knee joints

Knee joints undergo various loading and unloading processes. Earlier investigations had a marginal focus on rate-dependent load response associated with viscoelastic and poromechanical behaviors of the joint. In this study, a fully meniscectomized porcine knee joint compression was simulated with a viscoelastic and poromechanical model of the knee joint. The model feature was implemented using the elastic properties of the fibrillar and nonfibrillar matrices and the permeability of the cartilages. The reaction force of the meniscectomized joint showed compression-rate-dependence: for a given compression magnitude, higher compression rate yielded higher reaction force. The reaction force predicted by the model generally agrees with the measurements from laboratory tests, which partially validates the modeling methodology.