Thermal-Comfort Design of Personalized Casts

Abstract

This paper introduces a novel method for designing personalized orthopedic casts which are aware of thermal-comfort while satisfying mechanical requirements. Our pipeline starts from thermal images taken by an infrared camera, by which the distribution of thermal-comfort sensitivity is generated on the surface of a 3D scanned model. We formulate a hollowed Voronoi tessellation pattern to represent the covered region for a web-like cast design. The pattern is further optimized according to the thermal-comfort sensitivity calculated from thermal images. Working together with a thickness variation method, we generate a solid model for a personalized cast maximizing both thermal comfort and mechanical stiffness. To demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach, 3D printed models of personalized casts are tested on body parts of different individuals.