Numerical Simulation of Flow in an Idealized Intracranial Aneurysm Model to Study the Effect of Non-newtonian Blood Flow Rheology

Rupture risk assessment of intracranial aneurysms has gained relevance in the recent years. Serious health issues such as Subarachnoid Haemorrhage (SAH), damage to the brain and death can occur if an aneurysm ruptures. Rupture risk prediction based on size cannot be considered accurate. There is no clinical method to predict rupture risk of aneurysm so far. Computational modelling is highly relevant in the study of aneurysms since the experimental approach is difficult. Thus, the rupture risk can be predicted using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). Although blood has non-Newtonian rheology, most CFD research to date have assumed Newtonian behaviour. Comparative study of various available non-Newtonian models and scope of developing a reliable model for intracranial blood flow simulations still remains. In the present work, numerical simulations have been carried out on idealized 2D half spherical aneurysm geometry to study the basic flow patterns and the impact of blood rheology on wall shear stress (WSS).