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Fatiesa Sulejmani
BME PhD Proposal
Date: Wednesday, November 7th, 2018
Time: 9:00 AM
Location: Technology Enterprise Park (TEP) Room 104
Thesis advisors:
Wei Sun, PhD (Georgia Tech, Biomedical Engineering)
Yunlong Huo, PhD (Peking University, Mechanical Engineering)
Thesis Committee:
Ajit Yoganathan, PhD (Georgia Tech, Biomedical Engineering)
Rudolph Gleason, PhD (Georgia Tech, Mechanical Engineering)
Glen Iannucci, MD (Emory University School of Medicine, Sibley Heart Center Cardiology)
Title: Biomechanical assessment of tricuspid regurgitation using experimental and computational approaches
Abstract:
Tricuspid regurgitation (TR) is a prevalent form of heart valve disease, affecting over 1.6 million Americans. Often diagnosed too late for surgical intervention due to its asymptomatic nature, only 1% of patients receive the current gold standard of care, surgical implantation of a tricuspid annuloplasty ring. As a result, industry has turned its attention towards the development of percutaneous methods of TR repair, which, while promising in compassionate use cases, have yet to be fully investigated, primarily due to a lack of data regarding the mechanical properties of right heart tissues.
To that end, the proposed study aims to apply an integrated experimental and computational approach to characterize the mechanics of TR repair. In Aim 1, a custom device and experimental protocol will be developed to replicate the tricuspid bicuspidization procedure and characterize its mechanics in porcine hearts for both active and passive states, as well as pre- and post- induction of TR. Micro-Computed Tomography (µCT) imaging will be then be employed to visualize the anatomy. The experimental and imaging technique will be subsequently applied to six human hearts, whose cardiac tissues will then be explanted for full characterization of the mechanical properties of the tricuspid valve and annulus, chordae tendineae, right ventricle, and right ventricular outflow tract.
In Aim 2, a computational model of the percutaneous cinching mechanism will be created and validated against the experimental results obtained in Aim 1 for the six human hearts. This will then be compared against finite element-smooth particle hydrodynamics coupled simulations of the surgical annuloplasty technique in real TR cases for a comprehensive and comparative mechanical evaluation of the two approaches under various conditions.
It is expected that the results from these studies provide complete sets of mechanical data from human tissues previously unavailable in the literature, inform clinical decision-making through the development of a new finite element platform, and provide valuable parameters for the development and enhancement of new TR repair devices and techniques.
