The stiffness characteristics and the kinematics response of the face of human cadaver are reported. Impact tests with human specimens are necessary to study the biomechanical response to impact, injury mechanisms and injury criteria. To complete existing test data, both INRETS-LBMC and the University of Heidelberg (UNH) performed impact tests on human cadavers.

This work, mainly funded by the European Commission (EC), is part of the task 2.1, of the ADRIA programme (Advanced crash Dummy Research for Injury Assessment in frontal test conditions).

About sixty (including twenty-four funded by the EC) impact tests were performed on fifteen cadavers by INRETS-LBMC. The impacts were delivered by an impactor simulating a steering wheel rim, to the forehead and to the upper maxilla at an angle to the fore-aft vertical (sagittal) plane in order to represent typical accident conditions. The UNH carried out a total of eight tests on four cadavers (funded by the EC). Each cadaver received a padded impact on the left face side and a rigid impact on the right face side.

The head kinematics were recorded by high speed film, and the force and the acceleration of the impactor were measured. This paper presents the results of human cadaver tests, including test conditions and sustained injuries, linear and angular acceleration-time histories, force-time histories, kinematics analysis, injury mechanics and medical findings