Consistent trilayer biomechanical modeling of aortic valve leaflet tissue. (16th August 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Bakhaty, Ahmed A.; Govindjee, Sanjay; Mofrad, Mohammad R.K.
• Is Part Of: Journal of biomechanics. Volume 61(2017)
• Page Start: 1
• Page End: 10
• Publication Date: 2017-08-16
• Subjects: Aortic valve -- Fiber micromechanics -- Anisotropy -- Multiscale -- Multiphysics; Animal mechanics -- Periodicals; Biomechanics -- Periodicals; Biomechanics -- Periodicals; Mécanique animale -- Périodiques; Biomécanique -- Périodiques; Electronic journals; 571.4305
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jbiomech.2017.06.014
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0021-9290

Abstract

Abstract: Aortic valve tissue exhibits highly nonlinear, anisotropic, and heterogeneous material behavior due to its complex microstructure. A thorough understanding of these characteristics permits us to develop numerical models that can shed insight on the function of the aortic valve in health and disease. Herein, we take a closer look at consistently capturing the observed physical response of aortic valve tissue in a continuum mechanics framework. Such a treatment is the first step in developing comprehensive multiscale and multiphysics models. We highlight two important aspects of aortic valve tissue behavior: the role of the collagen fiber microstructure and the native prestressing. We propose a model that captures these two features as well as the heterogeneous layer-scale topology of the tissue. We find the model can reproduce the experimentally observed multiscale mechanical behavior in a manner that provides intuition on the underlying mechanics.