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Microstructure and Mechanics of Human Aortas in Health and Disease

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Biomechanics: Trends in Modeling and Simulation

Part of the book series: Studies in Mechanobiology, Tissue Engineering and Biomaterials ((SMTEB,volume 20))

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Abstract

Human aortas are three-layered fibrous composites assembled by a ground matrix and embedded families of dispersed collagen fibers. The microstructural arrangement of the collagen fibers alters due to diseases such as aneurysms. We review a general dispersion model that is required to describe the mechanical response of a variety of collagenous tissues such as aortic walls considering three structural and three material parameters. The dispersion model is used to capture the remarkable differences in the microstructure and mechanics of healthy and aneurysmatic aortas. Related modeling/simulation of an aortic dissection is provided using the recently developed phase-field approach. An energy-based anisotropic failure criterion is used to numerically simulate the evolution of the crack phase-field in a simple shear test. Model parameters are provided and numerical results agree favorably with the experimental findings. Finally, an aortic clamping simulation is described by considering the individual aortic layers, residual stresses, nonsymmetric blood pressure after clamping, patient-specific data and damage-induced inelastic phenomena, i.e., stress softening and permanent deformations.

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Acknowledgments

I would like to thank many colleagues for their encouragement and perspective in the modeling of cardiovascular solid mechanics, in particular to Prof. Ray W. Ogden, FRS, FRSE, with whom I had the honor to fruitfully cooperate the last 20 years. I am also pleased to acknowledge the essential support and the helpful discussions of the many former and current doctoral and postdoctoral students who worked with me, performing experiments in the lab on cardiovascular tissues, producing images with microscopes, and elaborating on related models used for numerical simulations of cardiovascular tissues in health and disease. In particular, I would like to thank some of my current coworkers in Graz, i.e., Dr. Anju Babu, Ms. Julia Brandstetter, Mr. Osman Gültekin, Mr. Daniel Haspinger, Dr. Kewei Li, Dr. Sae-Il Murtada, Ms. Justyna A. Niestrawska, Ms. Selda Sherifova, Dr. Gerhard Sommer, and Ms. Bettina Strametz. Finally, I gratefully acknowledge funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), research grant no. NIH R01HL117063.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Graz University of Technology, 8010, Graz, Austria

    Gerhard A. Holzapfel

  2. Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), 7491, Trondheim, Norway

    Gerhard A. Holzapfel

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  1. Gerhard A. Holzapfel
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Correspondence to Gerhard A. Holzapfel .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Biomechanics, Graz University of Technology, Graz, Austria

    Gerhard A. Holzapfel

  2. School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, United Kingdom

    Ray W. Ogden

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Holzapfel, G.A. (2017). Microstructure and Mechanics of Human Aortas in Health and Disease. In: Holzapfel, G., Ogden, R. (eds) Biomechanics: Trends in Modeling and Simulation. Studies in Mechanobiology, Tissue Engineering and Biomaterials, vol 20. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41475-1_4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41475-1_4

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