Background and aim: Human knee joints experience very large loads and motions during regular daily, occupational and sport activities. Consequently, they are at high risk of being exposed to injuries and degeneration. Osteoarthritis and ligament injuries often inflict knee joints causing considerable pain and loss of productivity involving thus significant human and economic costs. Hence, biomechanics of human knee joints has been the focus of many investigations with the primary aim to improve understanding of joint function in normal and perturbed conditions. The existing prevention and treatment programs have been based on such studies.
Material and Methods: Due to inherent costs, limitations, difficulties and ethical concerns associated with in vivo and in vitro cadaveric studies, finite element model studies have been developed as effective, powerful and complementary tools to investigate knee joint biomechanics subject to internal and external mechanical conditions affecting its normal function.
Results: The advantage of finite element method in study of joint biomechanics lies in its robustness to incorporate complex 3D joint geometry, intricate boundary and loading conditions and materials with nonhomogeneous and nonlinear properties.
Conclusion:This article reviews important model studies, presents their relevant results and discusses some of the promising future directions.

Background and aim: One of the main problems in learning is ignoring the teaching in small group discussion.So, today, teaching in student-based methods such as work in small group is emphasized. Nevertheless, this method is not used for teaching physiotherapy students. This study was performed to determine the effect of teaching in small group on satisfaction and learning level of second- year students in physiotherapy in comparison  with lecture teaching.
Materials and methods: An experimental study was performed on 29 physiotherapy students. The students were randomly classified into two groups lecture (14 people) and work in small group (15 people). Students were educated for 4 sessions. Two separate questionnaires were used to assess learning and satisfaction levels.
Results: Overall satisfaction in small group was significantly greater than lecture group (P<0.0001). However, there was no significant difference between learning levels of the methods (p>0.05). 86.7% of students in small groups preferred to be educated in the future semesters using this teaching method.
Conclusion: This study showed the role of small group teaching on increasing students' satisfaction level. Due to increased satisfaction in small group, despite the lack of significant difference between the two methods of learning, learning process can be facilitated .Thus this method is recommended for education of the undergraduate students.