55 research outputs found
Immersed boundary-finite element model of fluid-structure interaction in the aortic root
It has long been recognized that aortic root elasticity helps to ensure
efficient aortic valve closure, but our understanding of the functional
importance of the elasticity and geometry of the aortic root continues to
evolve as increasingly detailed in vivo imaging data become available. Herein,
we describe fluid-structure interaction models of the aortic root, including
the aortic valve leaflets, the sinuses of Valsalva, the aortic annulus, and the
sinotubular junction, that employ a version of Peskin's immersed boundary (IB)
method with a finite element (FE) description of the structural elasticity. We
develop both an idealized model of the root with three-fold symmetry of the
aortic sinuses and valve leaflets, and a more realistic model that accounts for
the differences in the sizes of the left, right, and noncoronary sinuses and
corresponding valve cusps. As in earlier work, we use fiber-based models of the
valve leaflets, but this study extends earlier IB models of the aortic root by
employing incompressible hyperelastic models of the mechanics of the sinuses
and ascending aorta using a constitutive law fit to experimental data from
human aortic root tissue. In vivo pressure loading is accounted for by a
backwards displacement method that determines the unloaded configurations of
the root models. Our models yield realistic cardiac output at physiological
pressures, with low transvalvular pressure differences during forward flow,
minimal regurgitation during valve closure, and realistic pressure loads when
the valve is closed during diastole. Further, results from high-resolution
computations demonstrate that IB models of the aortic valve are able to produce
essentially grid-converged dynamics at practical grid spacings for the
high-Reynolds number flows of the aortic root
Simulating the fluid dynamics of natural and prosthetic heart valves using the immersed boundary method
The immersed boundary method is both a general mathematical framework and a particular numerical approach to problems of fluid-structure interaction. In the present work, we describe the application of the immersed boundary method to the simulation of the fluid dynamics of heart valves, including a model of a natural aortic valve and a model of a chorded prosthetic mitral valve. Each valve is mounted in a semi-rigid flow chamber. In the case of the mitral valve, the flow chamber is a circular pipe, and in the case of the aortic valve, the flow chamber is a model of the aortic root. The model valves and flow chambers are immersed in a viscous incompressible fluid, and realistic fluid boundary conditions are prescribed at the upstream and downstream ends of the chambers. To connect the immersed boundary models to the boundaries of the fluid domain, we introduce a novel modification of the standard immersed boundary scheme. In particular, near the outer boundaries of the fluid domain, we modify the construction of the regularized delta function which mediates fluid-structure coupling in the immersed boundary method, whereas in the interior of the fluid domain, we employ a standard four-point delta function which is frequently used with the immersed boundary method. The standard delta function is used wherever possible, and the modified delta function continuously transitions to the standard delta function away from the outer boundaries of the fluid domain. Three-dimensional computational results are presented to demonstrate the capabilities of our immersed boundary approach to simulating the fluid dynamics of heart valves
Speaking rate affects the perception of duration as a suprasegmental lexical-stress cue
Item does not contain fulltextThree categorization experiments investigated whether the speaking rate of a preceding sentence influences durational cues to the perception of suprasegmental lexical-stress patterns. Dutch two-syllable word fragments had to be judged as coming from one of two longer words that matched the fragment segmentally but differed in lexical stress placement. Word pairs contrasted primary stress on either the first versus the second syllable or the first versus the third syllable. Duration of the initial or the second syllable of the fragments and rate of the preceding context (fast vs. slow) were manipulated. Listeners used speaking rate to decide about the degree of stress on initial syllables whether the syllablesâ absolute durations were informative about stress (Experiment 1a) or not (Experiment 1b). Rate effects on the second syllable were visible only when the initial syllable was ambiguous in duration with respect to the preceding rate context (Experiment 2). Absolute second syllable durations contributed little to stress perception (Experiment 3). These results suggest that speaking rate is used to disambiguate words and that rate-modulated stress cues are more important on initial than non-initial syllables. Speaking rate affects perception of suprasegmental information
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