Pulsatile flow

About: Pulsatile flow is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 6278 publications have been published within this topic receiving 149638 citations.

Blood flow patterns in the proximal human coronary arteries: relationship to atherosclerotic plaque occurrence.

Abstract: Atherosclerotic plaques in human coronary arteries are focal manifestations of systemic disease, and biomechanical factors have been hypothesized to contribute to plaque genesis and localization. We developed a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model of the ascending aorta and proximal sections of the right and left coronary arteries of a normal human subject using computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and determined the pulsatile flow field. Results demonstrate that flow patterns in the ascending aorta contribute to a pro-atherosclerotic flow environment, specifically through localization of low and oscillatory wall shear stress in the neighborhood of coronary orifices. Furthermore, these patterns differ in their spatial distribution between right and left coronary arteries. Entrance effects of aortic flow diminish within two vessel diameters. We examined relationships between spatial distributions of wall shear stress and reports of plaque occurrence in the literature. Results indicate low wall shear stress is co-located with increased incidence of lesions, and higher wall shear stresses are associated with lesion-resistant areas. This investigation does not consider plaque progression or advanced lesions, inasmuch as the CFD model was developed from a normal individual and the clinical data used for comparisons were obtained from autopsy specimens of subjects who died from non-cardiovascular causes. The data reported are consistent with the hypothesis that low wall shear stress is associated with the localization of atherosclerotic lesions, and the results demonstrate the importance of aortic flow on flow patterns in the proximal segments of the coronary arteries.

A computational pulsatile model of the bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis: the influence of pulmonary forward flow.

Abstract: The bidirectional cavopulmonary anastomosis (BCPA or bidirectional Glenn) is an operation to treat congenital heart diseases of the right heart by diverting the systemic venous return from the superior vena cava to both lungs. The main goal is to provide the correct perfusion to both lungs avoiding an excessive increase in systemic venous pressure. One of the factors which can affect the clinical outcome of the surgically reconstructed circulation is the amount of pulsatile blood flow coming from the main pulmonary artery. The purpose of this work is to analyse the influence of this factor on the BCPA hemodynamics. A 3-D finite element model of the BCPA has been developed to reproduce the flow of the surgically reconstructed district. Geometry and hemodynamic data have been taken from angiocardiogram and catheterization reports, respectively. On the basis of the developed 3-D model, four simulations have been performed with increasing pulsatile blood flow rate from the main pulmonary artery. The results show that hemodynamics in the pulmonary arteries are greatly influenced by the amount of flow through the native main pulmonary artery and that the flow from the superior vena cava allows to have a similar distribution of the blood to both lungs, with a little predilection for the left side, in agreement with clinical postoperative data.

Effect of body acceleration on pulsatile flow of Casson fluid through a mild stenosed artery

Abstract: The pulsatile flow of blood through a stenosed artery under the influence of external periodic body acceleration is studied. The effect of non-Newtonian nature of blood in small blood vessels has been taken into account by modeling blood as a Casson fluid. The non-linear coupled equations governing the flow are solved using perturbation analysis assuming that the Womersley frequency parameter is small which is valid for physiological situations in small blood vessels. The effect of pulsatility, stenosis, body acceleration, yield stress of the fluid and pressure gradient on the yield plane locations, velocity distribution, flow rate, shear stress and frictional resistance are investigated. It is noticed that the effect of yield stress and stenosis is to reduce flow rate and increase flow resistance. The impact of body acceleration is to enhance the flow rate and reduces resistance to flow.