WIAS Preprint No. 2555, (2018)

Multiscale modeling of vascularized tissues via non-matching immersed methods



Authors

  • Heltai, Luca
    ORCID: 0000-0001-5514-4683
  • Caiazzo, Alfonso
    ORCID: 0000-0002-7125-8645

2010 Mathematics Subject Classification

  • 74F10 74Q99 74S05 74G15

Keywords

  • Immersed boundary method, finite element, vascularized tissue, fluid-structure interaction, multiscale methods

DOI

10.20347/WIAS.PREPRINT.2555

Abstract

We consider a multiscale approach based on immersed methods for the efficient computational modeling of tissues composed of an elastic matrix (in two or three-dimensions) and a thin vascular structure (treated as a co-dimension two manifold) at a given pressure. We derive different variational formulations of the coupled problem, in which the effect of the vasculature can be surrogated in the elasticity equations via singular or hyper-singular forcing terms. These terms only depends on information defined on co-dimension two manifolds (such as vessel center line, cross sectional area, and mean pressure over cross section), thus drastically reducing the complexity of the computational model. We perform several numerical tests, ranging from simple cases with known exact solutions to the modeling of materials with random distributions of vessels. In the latter case, we use our immersed method to perform an in silico characterization of the mechanical properties of the effective biphasic material tissue via statistical simulations.

Appeared in

  • Internat. J. Numer. Methods Biomedical Engrg., 35 (2019), pp. 3264/1--3264/32, DOI 10.1002/cnm.3264 .

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