Polygonal surface processing and mesh generation tools for the numerical simulation of the cardiac function.

Area of Science:

• Computational Science
• Biomedical Engineering
• Medical Imaging

Background:

• Accurate computational mesh generation is critical for patient-specific cardiac function simulation.
• Existing methods require significant ad-hoc processing of raw polygonal surfaces from medical imaging or template geometries.
• This processing is essential for creating suitable volumetric meshes for simulation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present novel algorithms and tools for facilitating cardiac mesh generation.
• To address key challenges in the cardiac mesh generation pipeline, including surface processing, boundary tagging, and mesh assembly.
• To enable the creation of personalized and optimized mesh generation pipelines for diverse cardiac simulations.

Main Methods:

• Development of specific polygonal surface processing algorithms tailored for cardiac geometries (e.g., chamber connection, segmentation outputs).
• Implementation of accurate boundary tag generation methods.
• Definition of mesh-size functions based on relevant geometric quantities.
• Algorithms for processing and connecting multiple volumetric meshes.

Main Results:

• The proposed algorithms, integrated into the open-source software vmtk, can be combined to form personalized mesh generation pipelines.
• These tools significantly accelerate the mesh generation process for a wide spectrum of cardiac applications.
• Demonstrated flexibility through various examples of cardiac mesh generation pipelines.

Conclusions:

• The developed algorithms and tools enhance the efficiency and flexibility of cardiac mesh generation.
• Patient-specific cardiac simulations can be performed more rapidly and accurately.
• The open-source nature of vmtk promotes accessibility and further development in the field.