In this paper, we characterized the hyperelastic and damage behavior of the Extensor Digitorum Longus (EDL) human tendon under loading conditions. The study was conducted in both categories of models, phenomenological and physically motivated, to allow the prediction and the macroscopic response of the tendon under specific loading conditions, assuming that its response follows a hyperelastic anisotropic model in conjunction with damage law. We benchmarked multiple hyperelastic and damage models to fit the response of the tendons in uniaxial tensile loading conditions, and by employing a genetic algorithm, we obtained the material parameters for both elastic and damage models. The objective of this study was to explore different mathematical models to determine which would be the best option to predict the behavior of tendons and ligaments in complex biological systems using Finite Elements (FE) models. Therefore, we took into account accuracy as well as computational features. We considered the model proposed by Shearer and coupled it with a sigmoid function, which governs the evolution of damage in tendons, as the most appropriate for the fitting of the experimental data. The achieved solution shows to be of high interest attributable to the simplicity of the damage law function and its low computational cost.
Keywords: Soft tissues; anisotropic hyperelasticity; damage; genetic algorithm; material characterization.