The proposal is focused on developing experimentally validated mathematical models of the mouse heart ventricular anatomy and wall mechanics and to use these models to quantify the relationship between wall stress and the onset of cardiac hypertrophy. Specific aims are to 1) to develop a detailed three-dimensional mathematical model of the mouse heart geometry including the ventricles, papillary muscles, and fiber organization via histology, image processing, and surface and vector field fitting, 2) to use this new model in numerical simulations of cardiac wall mechanics to drive the deformation of the nonlinear, anisotropic cardiac muscle using the finite element method., 3) to correlate regional wall stresses with the early onset of physiological hypertrophy in the left ventricle (swimming mouse model) and 4) to impact high school students from underrepresented minorities through an outreach program of activities that explore the cardiovascular system in terms of anatomy, physiology, engineering, and physics.
