title: Building a 3D Virtual Liver: Methods for Simulating Blood Flow and Hepatic Clearance on 3D Structures.
abstract: In this paper, we develop a spatio-temporal modeling approach to describe blood and drug flow, as well as drug uptake and elimination, on an approximation of the liver. Extending on previously developed computational approaches, we generate an approximation of a liver, which consists of a portal and hepatic vein vasculature structure, embedded in the surrounding liver tissue. The vasculature is generated via constrained constructive optimization, and then converted to a spatial grid of a selected grid size. Estimates for surrounding upscaled lobule tissue properties are then presented appropriate to the same grid size. Simulation of fluid flow and drug metabolism (hepatic clearance) are completed using discretized forms of the relevant convective-diffusive-reactive partial differential equations for these processes. This results in a single stage, uniformly consistent method to simulate equations for blood and drug flow, as well as drug metabolism, on a 3D structure representative of a liver.
authors.affiliation: Department of Mathematics, Clarkson University, Potsdam, New York, United States of America.
authors.forename: Diana
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: White
authors.affiliation: Computer Modelling Group Ltd, Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
authors.forename: Dennis
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Coombe
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Sciences, MacEwan University, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
authors.forename: Vahid
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Rezania
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Department of Oncology, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
authors.forename: Jack
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tuszynski
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D000818:Animals; D003198:Computer Simulation; D004285:Dogs; D006439:Hemodynamics; D006801:Humans; D008099:Liver / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000098:blood supply* / Q000378:metabolism*; D008102:Liver Circulation; D008953:Models, Anatomic; D008954:Models, Biological; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations