Temporal variation of wall shear stress on the aneurysms in the supraclinoid internal carotid artery

Abstract

We investigate temporal and spatial variation of wall shear stress (WSS) vectors in aneurysms in the supraclinoid internal carotid artery (ICA). This study shows that contrary to our expectation, WSS vectors do not change their directions significantly over the cycle, especially when the WSS magnitude is larger that 5 N/m2. However, the direction-change may increase as high as 100 degrees when the WSS magnitude is small or hydrodynamic instability exists inside the aneurysms or when the swirling motion in the ICA segment is strong. Minimum WSS and maximum WSS magnitude on a patch demonstrate a linear relationship.