A numerical simulation of the non-Newtonian blood flow through a curved artery with stenosis

Arterial stenosis such as Atherosclerosis is one of the mostserious forms of arterial disease which homodynamic factorsplay a significant role in the formation of it. Stenosis occursmore often in curved artery such as left coronary artery (LCA)that have a mild curvature. In this paper a 3-D left coronaryartery with 60% cross-sectional area reductions (stenosis) isconsidered. The main assumptions are laminar, 3-D geometry,incompressible, steady state and non-Newtonian flow (withHerschel Bulkley model).The governing equations, continuityand momentum, are non-dimensionalized with respect tospecific variables. The set of governing differential equationsare integrated to yield of finite difference equations and thensolved together with procedure of the SIMPLE program. Wallshear stress (wss) profile, in length of artery is calculated. Theresults indicated that stenosis section, with high wall shearstress values are vulnerable sites to the initiation anddevelopment of thrombus formation lesions which leads toatheroembolic stroke and atherosclerosis disease. Obtainedresults agree with previous work in simple cases.

Keywords:

Stenosis , Numerical simulation , Blood flow , Atherosclerosis disease