Prosthetic heart valves (PHV) have been in use for over four ? decades to replace diseased heart valves. However, present-day designs are far from ideal and ? significant complications such as hemolysis, plateletdestruction, and thromboembolism often arise after ? their implantation, requiring aggressive life long anticoagulation therapy which in turn carries serious ? side effects. Improving current PHV designs, however, needs highly accurate flow quantification - a ? task not achievable until recently due to the complex and intricate geometries of PHVs combined with ? the lack of an appropriate computational methodology to tackle the complexities of PHV flows. Novel ? fluid-structure interaction CFD tools have been successfully developed and validated in the current ? grant. Along with numerous experimental studies, this numerical tool has yielded the first ever in depth ? understanding of the complex physics of PHV flows under physiological conditions and at hemodynamically relevant scales. The proposed competing renewal takes the next step towards ? achieving the development of a computational framework for improving valve prosthesis designs on a ? patient-specific basis. Current Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) technology makes it possible to ? obtain full 3D moving geometries at resolution sufficiently high to prescribe aorta and ventricular wall ? motions as boundary conditions for the numerical model. By coupling high resolution CFD techniques ? with the latest advancements in MRI technology, a powerful and clinically useful hemodynamic/fluid ? dynamic analysis tool could be developed for the benefit of PHV recipients. ? ? The overall hypothesis driving this competing renewal is: High resolution, imaging-based Computational ? Fluid Dynamics (CFD) modeling can be used to develop viable patient-specific hemodynamic tools ? where cardiac devices (not only limited to heart valve prostheses) may be evaluated prior to patient ? treatment. This hypothesis will be addressed in the following four aims: ? ? Aim 1: Development of CFD tools for left ventricle/aorta configuration ? ? Aim 2: In vitro experiments for validation in a phantom left ventricle/aorta configuration with moving ? boundaries ? ? Aim 3: Develop image processing methods for reconstruction of anatomically accurate moving ventricle ? and aorta geometries ? ? Aim 4: Preliminary application of the computational tools for patient simulation and analysis Completion ? of this project will lead to a significant advancement in the field of heart valve flow analysis and the ? development of fluid mechanically improved cardiac devices.
? Present day designs of prosthetic heart valves are far from ideal and significant risk of complications exist requiring patients to undergo aggressive life long anti-coagulation therapy which in turn carries ? additional risks. In this competing renewal, the computational technology produced during the original ? grant is further developed to be able to simulate flows in patient specific anatomies. This will be ? achieved by obtaining actual geometries of patients using magnetic resonance imaging and coupling this information with a more sophisticated and improved version of the current computational fluid ? dynamics software. ? ? ?
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