Results of new investigations about the global tensile stiffness and strength of the
periodontal ligament are presented. Experimental results are reported first, referring
to the extraction of swine teeth from their sockets: force–displacement curves are
shown, obtained from samples including a portion of the jaw and a canine swine
tooth. Numerical simulations of the same tooth extraction tests are then presented,
which exploit specific modelling techniques previously developed. In particular,
use is made of an interface finite element capable to describe the fibrous
structure of the periodontal ligament, and of a stress–stretch constitutive model,
for a single collagen fibre, based on the multiscale nature of its subfibrillar
microstructure. The comparison between the new experimental results and the
numerical ones helps in understanding the soundness of the adopted mechanical
models in the simulations. This study is expected to be mainly useful in
providing results usable for the indirect validation of mechanical models of
both the periodontal ligament and its basic constituent, the single collagen
fibre.