Browsing by Author "Zhao, Xuefeng"

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    Biaxial deformation of collagen and elastin fibers in coronary adventitia
    (American Physiological Society (APS), 2013-12-01) Chen, Huan; Slipchenko, Mikhail N.; Liu, Yi; Zhao, Xuefeng; Cheng, Ji-Xin; Lanir, Yoram; Kassab, Ghassan S.; Department of Biomedical Engineering, Purdue School of Engineering and Technology, IUPUI
    The microstructural deformation-mechanical loading relation of the blood vessel wall is essential for understanding the overall mechanical behavior of vascular tissue in health and disease. We employed simultaneous mechanical loading-imaging to quantify in situ deformation of individual collagen and elastin fibers on unstained fresh porcine coronary adventitia under a combination of vessel inflation and axial extension loading. Specifically, the specimens were imaged under biaxial loads to study microscopic deformation-loading behavior of fibers in conjunction with morphometric measurements at the zero-stress state. Collagen fibers largely orientate in the longitudinal direction, while elastin fibers have major orientation parallel to collagen, but with additional orientation angles in each sublayer of the adventitia. With an increase of biaxial load, collagen fibers were uniformly stretched to the loading direction, while elastin fibers gradually formed a network in sublayers, which strongly depended on the initial arrangement. The waviness of collagen decreased more rapidly at a circumferential stretch ratio of λθ = 1.0 than at λθ = 1.5, while most collagen became straightened at λθ = 1.8. These microscopic deformations imply that the longitudinally stiffer adventitia is a direct result of initial fiber alignment, and the overall mechanical behavior of the tissue is highly dependent on the corresponding microscopic deformation of fibers. The microstructural deformation-loading relation will serve as a foundation for micromechanical models of the vessel wall.
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    Non-linear micromechanics of soft tissues
    (Elsevier, 2014-11) Chen, Huan; Zhao, Xuefeng; Kassab, Ghassan; Biomedical Engineering, School of Engineering and Technology
    Microstructure-based constitutive models have been adopted in recent studies of non-linear mechanical properties of biological soft tissues. These models provide more accurate predictions of the overall mechanical responses of tissues than phenomenological approaches. Based on standard approximations in non-linear mechanics, we classified the microstructural models into three categories: (1) uniform-field models with solid-like matrix, (2) uniform-field models with fluid-like matrix, and (3) second-order estimate models. The first two categories assume affine deformation field where the deformation of microstructure is the same as that of the tissue, regardless of material heterogeneities; i.e., they represent the upper bounds of the exact effective strain energy and stress of soft tissues. In addition, the first type is not purely structurally motivated and hence cannot accurately predict the microscopic mechanical behaviors of soft tissues. The third category considers realistic geometrical features, material properties of microstructure and interactions among them and allows for flexible deformation in each constituent. The uniform-field model with fluid-like matrix and the second-order estimate model are microstructure-based, and can be applied to different tissues based on micro-structural features.
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    Simulation of mechanical environment in active lead fixation: effect of fixation helix size
    (The American Society of Mechanical Engineers, 2011-06) Zhao, Xuefeng; Wenk, Jonathan F.; Burger, Mike; Liu, Yi; Das, Mithilesh K.; Combs, William; Ge, Liang; Guccione, Julius M.; Kassab, Ghassan S.; Biomedical Engineering, School of Engineering and Technology
    The risk of myocardial penetration due to active-fixation screw-in type pacing leads has been reported to increase as the helix electrodes become smaller. In order to understand the contributing factors for lead penetration, we conducted finite element analyses of acute myocardial micro-damage induced by a pacemaker lead screw-in helix electrode. We compared the propensity for myocardial micro-damage of seven lead designs including a baseline model, three modified designs with various helix wire cross-sectional diameters, and three modified designs with different helix diameters. The comparisons show that electrodes with a smaller helix wire diameter cause more severe micro-damage to the myocardium in the early stage. The damage severity, represented by the volume of failed elements, is roughly the same in the middle stage, whereas in the later stage the larger helix wire diameter generally causes more severe damage. The onset of myocardial damage is not significantly affected by the helix diameter. As the helix diameter increases, however, the extent of myocardial damage increases accordingly. The present findings identified several of the major risk factors for myocardial damage whose consideration for lead use and design might improve acute and chronic lead performance.