Numerical simulations of a 3D fluid-structure interaction model for blood flow in an atherosclerotic artery

Abstract

The inflammatory process of atherosclerosis leads to the formation of an atheromatous plaque in the intima of the blood vessel. The plaque rupture may result from the interaction between the blood and the plaque. In each cardiac cycle, blood interacts with the vessel, considered as a compliant nonlinear hyperelastic. A three dimensional idealized fluid-structure interaction (FSI) model is constructed to perform the blood-plaque and blood-vessel wall interaction studies. An absorbing boundary condition (BC) is imposed directly on the outflow in order to cope with the spurious reflexions due to the truncation of the computational domain. The difference between the Newtonian and non-Newtonian effects is highlighted. It is shown that the von Mises and wall shear stresses are significantly affected according to the rigidity of the wall. The numerical results have shown that the risk of plaque rupture is higher in the case of a moving wall, while in the case of a fixed wall the risk of progression of the atheromatous plaque is higher.

Mathematical modelling of atherosclerosis

“…The maximal and the average value of the WSS is higher for the fixed wall ( Fig. 3) while fibrous cap displacement at the pressure peak is weaker for fixed wall than for moving wall [88]. The plaque stress value depends on the degree of stenosis and on the cap thickness.…”

“…Three-dimensional FSI models incorporating fluid-structure interaction (blood-plaque and blood-wall) as well as non-Newtonian effects in a 3D geometry to analyze the flow and structures stresses are considered in the literature. Reference [88] provides a generalization of the study done in [28] with more realistic pressure input profile [27] at the inlet and a linear absorbing condition (LAC) at the outlet [92]. The recent advanced approach incorporates stand alone 3D model into a reduced order model of systemic hemodynamics [108].…”

Fluid-structure interaction models based on patient-specific IVUS at baseline and follow-up for prediction of coronary plaque progression by morphological and biomechanical factors: A preliminary study

“…In vivo IVUS-based 3D FSI models with anisotropic material properties and pre-shrink-stretch process were constructed for each coronary plaque to obtain plaque stress, strain and flow wall shear stress conditions. Blood flow was assumed to be laminar, Newtonian (Yang et al, 2007; Kari et al, 2017), and incompressible. The Navier-Stokes equations with arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) formulation were used as the governing equations.…”

Transient numerical simulation of the right coronary artery originating from the left sinus and the effect of its acute take-off angle on hemodynamics

“…Studying the relationship between blood flow characteristics and the development of vascular diseases has provided a deeper understanding of these diseases. Such knowledge also plays an important role in diagnoses and surgical evaluations (19)(20)(21)(22).…”