Fast and accurate pressure-drop prediction in straightened atherosclerotic coronary arteries

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Engineering
• Fluid Dynamics
• Cardiovascular Research

Background:

• Atherosclerotic disease progression is linked to wall shear stress in coronary arteries.
• Accurate patient-specific wall shear stress computation requires computational fluid dynamics (CFD).
• CFD requires precise boundary conditions, such as pressure drop, which are challenging to obtain.

Purpose of the Study:

• To propose and validate a novel method for computing pressure drop proximal and distal to coronary artery plaques.
• To establish a simplified approach for estimating pressure drop that can serve as a CFD boundary condition.
• To correlate pressure drop predictions with coronary artery geometry and flow characteristics.

Main Methods:

• Investigated ten straightened coronary artery models.
• Calculated flow fields using CFD and fitted velocity profiles.
• Simplified Navier-Stokes equations to estimate pressure drop (Δp (1)) using fitted profiles.
• Validated Δp (1) against CFD-derived pressure drop (Δp CFD).
• Developed a predictive model (Δp geom) relating pressure drop to geometry and flow.

Main Results:

• The simplified method (Δp (1)) accurately estimated CFD pressure drop (Δp CFD) with a single free parameter (β).
• The parameter β was successfully linked to geometry and flow.
• Excellent agreement was achieved between the geometry-based prediction (Δp geom) and CFD results (3.9 ± 4.9% difference at Re = 150).

Conclusions:

• The proposed method provides a quick and accurate way to predict pressure drop in straightened, mildly diseased coronary arteries.
• This approach simplifies the process of obtaining essential boundary conditions for CFD analysis in cardiovascular research.
• The findings support the use of geometry and flow data for efficient pressure drop estimation in atherosclerotic artery modeling.