A Strain-Based Model for Mechanical Hemolysis Based on a Coarse-Grained Red Blood Cell Model

作者：Ezzeldin Hussein M; de Tullio Marco D; Vanella Marcos; Solares Santiago D; Balaras Elias^*

来源：Annals of Biomedical Engineering, 2015, 43(6): 1398-1409.

DOI：10.1007/s10439-015-1273-z

• Mechanical hemolysis
• Multiscale modeling
• Ventricular assist devices
• Prosthetic heart valves
• Computational fluid dynamics

Mechanical hemolysis is a major concern in the design of cardiovascular devices, such as prosthetic heart valves and ventricular assist devices. The primary cause of mechanical hemolysis is the impact of the device on the local blood flow, which exposes blood elements to non-physiologic conditions. The majority of existing hemolysis models correlate red blood cell (RBC) damage to the imposed fluid shear stress and exposure time. Only recently more realistic, strain-based models have been proposed, where the RBC's response to the imposed hydrodynamic loading is accounted for. In the present work we extend strain-based models by introducing a high-fidelity representation of RBCs, which is based on existing coarse-grained particle dynamics approach. We report a series of numerical experiments in simple shear flows of increasing complexity, to illuminate the basic differences between existing models and establish their accuracy in comparison to the high-fidelity RBC approach. We also consider a practical configuration, where the flow through an artificial heart valve is computed. Our results shed light on the strengths and weaknesses of each approach and identify the key gaps that should be addressed in the development of new models.

• 出版日期2015-6