Smoothed particle hydrodynamic modelling of the cerebrospinal fluid for brain biomechanics: accuracy and stability
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Published version
Author(s)
Duckworth, Harry
Sharp, David J
Ghajari, Mazdak
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
The Cerebrospinal Fluid (CSF) can undergo shear deformations under head motions. Finite Element (FE) models, which are commonly used to simulate biomechanics of the brain, including traumatic brain injury, employ solid elements to represent the CSF. However, the limited number of elements paired with shear deformations in CSF can decrease the accuracy of their predictions. Large deformation problems can be accurately modelled using the mesh-free Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) method, but there is limited previous work on using this method for modelling the CSF. Here we explored the stability and accuracy of key modelling parameters of an SPH model of the CSF when predicting relative brain/skull displacements in a simulation of an in vivo mild head impact in human. The Moving Least Squares (MLS) SPH formulation and Ogden rubber material model were found to be the most accurate and stable. The strain and strain rate in the brain differed across the SPH and FE models of CSF. The FE mesh anchored the gyri, preventing them from experiencing the level of strains seen in the in vivo brain experiments and predicted by the SPH model. Additionally, SPH showed higher levels of strains in the sulci compared to the FE model. However, tensile instability was found to be a key challenge of the SPH method, which needs to be addressed in future. Our study provides a detailed investigation of the use of SPH and shows its potential for improving the accuracy of computational models of brain biomechanics.
Date Issued
2021-04-01
Date Acceptance
2021-01-22
Citation
International Journal for Numerical Methods in Biomedical Engineering, 2021, 37 (4)
ISSN
1069-8299
Publisher
John Wiley and Sons
Journal / Book Title
International Journal for Numerical Methods in Biomedical Engineering
Volume
37
Issue
4
Copyright Statement
© 2021 The Authors. International Journal for Numerical Methods in Biomedical Engineering published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
License URL
Sponsor
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust- BRC Funding
Wellcome Trust
Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust- BRC Funding
Grant Number
2024686
RDC04 79560
105603/Z/14/Z
RDC04
Subjects
Finite Element Analysis
Traumatic Brain Injury
Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics
Cerebrospinal Fluid
Publication Status
Published
Coverage Spatial
United Kingdom
Article Number
ARTN e3440
Date Publish Online
2021-01-22