2008 Annual Meeting
(602c) Eulerian Particle Tracking in Bifurcating Biofluids
Authors
Clinton W. Wininger - Presenter, Arizona State University
Jeffrey Heys, Arizona State University
Biofluid flows in bifurcating geometries has become paramount to the medical community. When addressing inhaled particulate matter in the lungs, it is essential to have an efficient computational model. High-order elements offer the opportunity to model nanoparticle deposition in a case by case basis with moderate computer processor times. This adds insight into cancer precipitation as well as an advantageous route to designing patient specific therapeutic aerosols. This study focuses on developing high-order methods for particle tracking in the weakly turbulent flows that are common in the biological setting. High-order elements are used for direct numerical simulation in the incompressible fluid flow to fully resolve the transporting field. The advection-diffusion is then solved with similar methods to predict a deposition of passive and dilute particles. Eulerian-Eulerian particle tracking has shown a route to developing drug delivery on an individual basis with moderate computing times. The quick adaptation and interpolation between meshes offers a promising perspective that lends towards the utilization in the medical community. The scientific code, Nek5000, and the computer cluster at Arizona State University is used to demonstrate the effectiveness of the field method. Experiments at University of Arizona lend validation to the models. Future work in biological particle tracking will hinge upon the community's abilities to adapt to high-order methods in an efficient manner.