A comparison between different asymmetric abdominal aortic aneurysm morphologies employing computational fluid–structure interaction analysis

Abstract

Considering representative asymmetric aneurysms in the abdominal aorta, the transient 3-D blood flow and pressure distributions as well as aneurysm wall stresses were numerically analyzed. To obtain more realistic and accurate results for blood flow fields and wall stress distributions, a coupled fluid-flow and solid–structure solver was employed. Geometric abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) variations studied included the degree of asymmetry, neck angle and bifurcation angle, and hence their impacts on the hemodynamics and biomechanics. The simulation results indicated that the assumption of symmetric AAA geometry may underestimate AAA-wall stress considerably. The neck angle influences the blood flow field substantially. A large neck angle, resulting in strong wall curvatures near the proximal neck, can produce aggravating blood flow patterns and elevated wall stresses (Von Mises). The iliac bifurcation angle affects blood flow patterns insignificantly but plays an important role in wall-stress concentrations. The wall stress of lateral asymmetric AAAs is higher than for the anterior-posterior asymmetric types. The maximum wall stress-site is located near the anterior distal side for the anterior-posterior asymmetric AAA and the distal side towards the asymmetric bulge in the lateral asymmetric AAA.