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Determining the angular acceleration of the head in automotive safety tests is one of the most important aspects of research on brain tolerance. For this purpose, a methodology combining various software packages and a specific accelerometer device has been developed at LPB-APR. The aim of the present publication is to evaluate this methodology for a variety of test-crash configurations, with or without head impact, i.e. frontal sled tests, steering wheel impacts and drop tests. The key feature of this study is the computing potential made possible by an accelerometer mount designed for the head of the Hybrid III dummy. In particular, the methodology developed allowed high angular acceleration levels to be computed, i.e. more than 15.000 rad/s2 in steering wheel impact. To confirm the results, examples of computing-measurement validation are given for each impact situation analyzed.

Although the neck is one of the least frequently injured body regions, it does play a considerable role in the solicitations of the head in side impact. It can, in fact, be said that the kinematic and dynamic conditions that govern, for instance, a head impact against a vehicle structure depend on the cervical segment. With a view to characterizing such conditions, i.e. head and neck responses, the LPB-APR conducted a research program including sled tests involving cadavers. These tests were conducted at a low and high G-level sled deceleration, respectively, with the low-violence tests being carried out following collaboration with the Naval Biodynamics Laboratory (New Orleans). Such tests enable direct comparison between volunteer data and cadaver data. The scope of this paper is to present a synthesis of the data obtained from LPB-APR low and high G-level tests, including, in particular, data obtained from new high severity tests.