Open-Full-Jaw: An open-access dataset and pipeline for finite element models of human jaw

TL;DR

This paper introduces an open-access dataset of 17 patient-specific finite-element models of human jaws derived from CBCT scans, along with a pipeline that streamlines model creation and ensures high-quality meshes for FE analysis.

Contribution

It provides a novel, efficient pipeline for generating accurate, high-quality FE models of the human jaw from CBCT data, along with an open dataset for research use.

Findings

Models are geometrically accurate with minimal deviations from input meshes.

Meshes are of high quality and suitable for FE analysis.

The dataset facilitates future population studies of jaw biomechanics.

Abstract

Developing computational models of the human jaw acquired from cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) scans is time-consuming and labor-intensive. Besides, a quantitative comparison is not attainable in the literature due to the involved manual tasks and the lack of surface/volumetric meshes. We share an open-access repository of 17 patient-specific finite-element (FE) models of human jaws acquired from CBCT scans and the utilized pipeline for generating them. The proposed pipeline minimizes model generation time and potential errors caused by human interventions. It gets dense surface meshes and provides reduced conformal surface/volumetric meshes suitable for FE analysis. We have quantified the geometrical variations of developed models and assessed models' accuracy from different aspects; (1) the maximum deviations from the input meshes, (2) the mesh quality, and (3) the simulation results. Our results indicate that the developed computational models are precise and have quality meshes suitable for various FE scenarios. Therefore, we believe this dataset will pave the way for future population studies.