ABSTRACT
The progressions of atherosclerosis in the carotid artery are mainly allied with local hemodynamic parameters and blood flow patterns. The parameters like wall shear stress, velocity profile, and circulation zone are required for understanding of development and progression of atherosclerosis. The goal of this study is to see whether different blood viscosity models would produce similar arterial wall shear stress and blood flow patterns in patient-specific bifurcated artery. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations are performed on bifurcated carotid artery and detailed characteristics of geometry are obtained from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) using an open-source Simvascular software. The blood viscosity models are categorized as Newtonian, Non-Newtonian Power-law, and Carreau viscosity models. These models are examined and compared for the wall shear stress, velocity profile, and mass flux through the fluid domain, which is important to identify and locate the flow phenomenon such as flow circulation and low wall shear stress region.
