NUMERICAL MODELING OF ATHEROSCLEROSIS LESION EVOLUTION IN TIME I. INITIAL STAGE OF THE DISEASE

Abstract

Atherosclerosis is one of the main causes of death in the developed world. The disease, which is an inflammatory disease, has been the focus of many studies. A few studies attempted to model atherosclerosis lesion development mathematically while no attention has been paid to the multistage nature of the disease. The present study provides a mathematical model for atherosclerosis evolution by focusing on the inflammatory responses of the initial stage of the disease. In the model, the inflammatory response in type I lesion, which includes endothelium dysfunction, LDL oxidation, monocytes entry, foam cell formation and intima property changes, are coupled with the transport equations of blood and LDL in lumen and arterial wall. The innovation of the model is determination of the duration of the initial stage of lesion propagation for a specific patient while the presence of leaky junction in endothelial layer and LDL oxidation in the intima layer are considered. The greatest advantage of the study in comparison with previous studies is to provide a model for the initiating stage of the atherosclerosis development so that a more precise result of the disease evolution is obtained.