Roberto Verzicco
University of Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy

Fluid dynamics of biologic and prosthetic heart valves

The dynamics of the functional unit aortic valve/aortic root/coronary arteries/ascending aorta is very complex owing to the interaction of several mechanisms that interfere each other; this makes in vivo and in vitro analyses very expensive and numerical simulations a desirable option. On the other hand a reliable numerical simulation has to cope with several different physical effects each of which is difficult "per se" In this paper we describe the results of high–fidelity numerical simulations showing the differences between biologic and prosthetic hearth valves and indicating the most critical phenomena that need to be addressed for the next generation devices.