title: The use of ligament efficiency to model fenestrations in the internal elastic lamina of cerebral arteries. I--modelling scheme.
abstract: The spatial geometry of fenestrations (windows) in the internal elastic lamina from human cerebral arteries is being characterized by a single parameter termed 'ligament efficiency', which is a ratio of the solid band of material to the centre-to-centre spacing between two or more holes. As a result, the apparent random distribution of fenestrations with variable diameters may be represented as a uniform array of holes with a single diameter. The actual arrangement of fenestrations from three separate tissue specimens were replicated in thin latex sheets by transposing the image of the fenestrations from photomicrographs obtained with the scanning electron microscope. In a similar manner, the uniform array of holes with an equivalent ligament efficiency are modelled in latex sheets. The tensile (stress-strain) properties of the latex sheets representing the replication and model configurations were comparable for all three specimens, even though their individual ligament efficiencies were different. The close similarity between the elastic characteristics for the two configurations, verifies the application of ligament efficiency to represent the spatial geometry of a perforated material such as the fenestrated internal elastic lamina.
mesh_terms: D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena; D002536:Cerebral Arteries / Q000502:physiology / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D004547:Elastic Tissue / Q000502:physiology / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D004548:Elasticity; D006801:Humans; D007840:Latex; D008954:Models, Biological; D013718:Tensile Strength
chemical_list: D007840:Latex