No abstract

Pulsatile flow of blood in a blood vessel having time-dependent shape (diameter) is investigated numerically in order to understand some important physiological phenomena in arteries. A smooth axi-symmetric cosine shaped constriction is considered. To mimic the realistic situation as far as possible, viscosity of blood is taken to be non-uniform, a shear-thinning viscosity model is considered and a physiologically relevant pulsatile flow is introduced. Taking advantage of axi-symmetry in the proposed problem, the stream function–vorticity formulation is used to solve the governing equations for blood flow. Effect of different parameters associated with the problem on the flow pattern has been investigated and disparities from the Newtonian case are discussed in detail.

No abstract

The objective of the present study is to investigate the effects of variable viscosity on incompressible laminar pulsatile flow of blood through an overlapping doubly constricted tapered artery. To mimic the realistic situation, wall of the artery is taken to be flexible, and physiologically relevant pulsatile flow is introduced. The governing equations of blood flow are made dimensionless. A coordinate transformation is used to make the overlapping doubly constricted wall geometry of tube to a straight tube. Taking advantage of the Stream function–Vorticity formulation, the system of partial differential equations is then solved numerically by finite difference approximations. Effects of Reynolds number, Strouhal number, degree of contraction, tapering angle, and viscosity parameters are presented graphically and analyzed. The results show that formation of stenosis and tapering disturb the flow field significantly, and degree of stenosis is more important in influencing blood flow compared with tapering.

The aim of this paper is to throw some light on the rheological study of pulsatile blood flow in a stenosed tapered arterial segment. Arterial wall is considered to be rigid and flexible separately for improving the similarity to the in vivo situation. The streaming blood is considered to be Newtonian. The governing nonlinear equations of motion are sought using the well-known stream function-vorticity method and are solved numerically by finite difference technique. Important rheological parameters, such as axial velocity component, wall shear stress, and flow separation region are estimated in the neighborhood of the stenosis. Effects of stenosis height, vessel tapering, and wall flexibility on the blood flow are investigated properly and are explained in detail through their graphical representations.