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Patient-Specific Modeling of Blood Flow and Pressure in Human Coronary Arteries

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Abstract

Coronary flow is different from the flow in other parts of the arterial system because it is influenced by the contraction and relaxation of the heart. To model coronary flow realistically, the compressive force of the heart acting on the coronary vessels needs to be included. In this study, we developed a method that predicts coronary flow and pressure of three-dimensional epicardial coronary arteries by considering models of the heart and arterial system and the interactions between the two models. For each coronary outlet, a lumped parameter coronary vascular bed model was assigned to represent the impedance of the downstream coronary vascular networks absent in the computational domain. The intramyocardial pressure was represented with either the left or right ventricular pressure depending on the location of the coronary arteries. The left and right ventricular pressure were solved from the lumped parameter heart models coupled to a closed loop system comprising a three-dimensional model of the aorta, three-element Windkessel models of the rest of the systemic circulation and the pulmonary circulation, and lumped parameter models for the left and right sides of the heart. The computed coronary flow and pressure and the aortic flow and pressure waveforms were realistic as compared to literature data.

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Acknowledgments

Hyun Jin Kim was supported by a Stanford Graduate Fellowship. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 0205741. The authors gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Dr. Nathan M. Wilson for assistance with software development. The authors gratefully acknowledge Dr. Farzin Shakib for the use of his linear algebra package AcuSolve™ (http://www.acusim.com) and the support of Simmetrix, Inc. for the use of the MeshSim™ (http://www.simmetrix.com) mesh generator.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aerospace Engineering Sciences, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, CO, 80309, USA

    H. J. Kim & K. E. Jansen

  2. INRIA, Paris-Rocquencourt BP 105, 78153, Le Chesnay Cedex, France

    I. E. Vignon-Clementel

  3. Department of Bioengineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, 94305, USA

    J. S. Coogan, C. A. Figueroa & C. A. Taylor

  4. Department of Surgery, Stanford University, E350 Clark Center, 318 Campus Drive, Stanford, CA, 94305, USA

    C. A. Taylor

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  1. H. J. Kim
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  2. I. E. Vignon-Clementel
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  3. J. S. Coogan
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  4. C. A. Figueroa
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  5. K. E. Jansen
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  6. C. A. Taylor
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Correspondence to C. A. Taylor.

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Associate Editor Peter E. McHugh oversaw the review of this article.

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Kim, H.J., Vignon-Clementel, I.E., Coogan, J.S. et al. Patient-Specific Modeling of Blood Flow and Pressure in Human Coronary Arteries. Ann Biomed Eng 38, 3195–3209 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10439-010-0083-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10439-010-0083-6

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