Characteristics of pulsatile blood flow through 3-D geometry of arterial stenosis

A numerical simulation is carried out to demonstrate the significant changes of flow behaviour for two different severities of arterial stenosis. Two stenosis levels of 65% and 85% are considered by area. The blood is considered as flowing fluid and assumed to be incompressible, homogeneous and Newtonian, while artery is assumed to be a rigid wall. The transient analysis is performed using ANSYS-14.5. The flow pattern, wall shear stress (WSS), pressure contours, and Centre-line velocity distribution are observed at early-systole, peak-systole and diastole for better understanding of arterial disease. Wall Share Stress distribution shows that as severity increases, sharing of flow also increases for all cases. Thus maximum stress is exerted in throat region at peak systole. The pressure distribution demonstrates that at all cases 85% stenotic artery creates more force than 65% stenotic artery at their pre-stenotic region. Interestingly, a recirculation region is visible at the post stenotic region in 85% stenotic artery for all cases and recirculation region increases with the decrease of the inlet flow velocity. Analysis indicates that the significant flow changes happen in the post stenotic region. (C) 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.