Global Stress-Strain Relationship of a Beating Heart

Abstract

An integrated computational-experimental method was developed to characterize the global nonlinear elastic stress-strain behavior of a beating rat heart. This method combines finite element (FE) simulation with the experimental end-diastolic cavity pressure- balloon volume relationship of left ventricle (LV) to characterize the deformation resistance of a beating heart. In the FE simulations, the hyperelastic Ogden strain energy potential was used and geometric nonlinearity was also considered. The elastic moduli for the ex-vivo rat heart obtained through the study vary from 0.003 to 0.577 MPa.