Analysis of Blood Flow Bifurcation Phenomena in Mitral Valve: A Numerical Approach to Predict Cardiac Arrest

Abstract

Employing FVM, we have investigated numerically the rheological behavior of bifurcation phenomena of blood flow at various Reynolds numbers (Re) and at various values of contraction ratio (h), defined as the ratio of the inlet to narrow sections width of a two-dimensional planner contraction-expansion channel. Blood flow bifurcation through a planar contraction-expansion channel is analogous to the case of regurgitation (i.e., abnormal leakage of blood) in the mitral valve. In this work, we have studied the blood flow bifurcation characteristics including the normalized axial velocity profile, velocity gradient, dimensionless pressure, dimensionless longitudinal pressure gradient, pressure and skin friction coefficients on both the channel walls and analyzed the pressure drop, excess pressure drop for different values of Re. Secondly, blockage in the mitral valve is studied for different values of h. Pressure drops for various values of h are also studied to measure blood pressure. Correlation analyses are presented for normalized vortex length in terms of critical values of Re and h. It is revealed that if Re goes on increasing to 14.4 or more, flow breaks the symmetry at h = 15, and for each , recirculation length increases linearly with the increase in Re but decreases valve flaps that reduce blood flow to the heart muscles.

Keywords

• contraction-expansion channel
• pressure drop
• pressure recovery factor
• bifurcation
• streamline
• numerical simulation