Modeling Arterial Blood Flow Using

OneDimensional NavierStokes

Richard Mata

Claremont Graduate University

Math 362
 Abstract

The human body contains 20 major arteries, with those arteries branching out into
an extensive network of arterioles, capillaries, and venules. This vast, complex system is
the life line for the human body, allowing the blood pumped from the heart to circulate
all throughout the body. When the crosssection of an artery is too narrow it becomes
more difficult for blood to flow through. As a result, health issues such as hypertension,
strokes, and heart attacks become more prominent. These deadly health issues is why it has
become so important to study the flow and dynamics of blood. This project aims to create
a mathematical model for arterial blood flow derived from the NavierStokes equations for
fluid flow.

1
Introduction

Like the circulatory system, the liquid make up of blood is complex. Blood contains
a mixture of both plasma and formed elements. The plasma contains a mixture of water,
proteins, and other solutes, with water making up 91.5%. The formed elements are made
up of platelets, along with white and red blood cells. This interaction between the formed
elements and the plasma is what gives blood the characteristics of a nonNewtonian fluid.
A nonNewtonian fluid is a fluid whose viscosity is dependent on the shear rate; however,
for a Newtonian fluid the viscosity is the constant of proportionality between the shear rate
and the shear stress. Thus, Newtonian fluids are the simplest to deal with when deriving
mathematical models of fluids that account for viscosity. For convenience, we assume that
our flow is an incompressible, axisymmetric, laminar, fullydeveloped, Newtonian flow with
gravitational forces being insignificant.
Such flows can be model with the use of the NavierStokes equations. Derived in the
1800s by George G. Stokes and ClaudeLouis Navier, these equations are extensions of
Eulers equations to include the effects of a fluids viscosity on the flow. These coupled
partial differential equations describe how the velocity, pressure, temperature, and density
of flowing fluid are related, and arise from apply Newtons second law of motion to fluid
flow. The equations consist of timedependent continuity equation for conservation of mass
equations, three timedependent conservation of energy equation in the x,y, and z direction,
and timedependent conservation of energy equation. Although complex, these equations
can be solved numerically with the solution being the flow velocity of the fluid in question.
For this project, we will use a simplified version of the NavierStokes equations for a one
dimensional (1D) flow in a rigid tube.
The 1D NavierStokes flow model is a widely used model for analyzing blood flow in
arteries. The simplicity of this model allows one to use numerical meshing techniques, such
as finite element, to create a simulation of flows in tubes. By coupling this model with a
pressurearea constitutive relation allows us to extend this model to elastic tubes and vessels.

2
Thus the 1D NavierStokes flow model of fluid flow is given by the following continuity mass
and momentum system:

A Q
t + =0

x

(1)

2
Q +

( QA ) + A p
+ Q =0
t x x A

where t 0, x [0, L] (L is the length of the tube), A(x, t) is the crosssectional area of the
tube, Q(x, t) is the volumetric flow rate, p is the fluid pressure, is the fluid density, is
the coefficient for viscosity friction, and is the momentum flux correction coefficient. The
coefficients and are defined as follows:

R
u2 dA
= ,
Au2

Q(x,t)
where u(x, t) = A(x,t)
is the mean fluid flow velocity; and

2v
= ,
1

where v is the kinematic viscosity of the fluid, which is the ratio of the viscosity to
the density of the fluid. For system of equations (1) we have two equations with three
unknowns: p, A, and Q. With more unknowns than equations we cannot solve our system
without another equation or deriving a relation between our unknowns. Therefore, we will
use the 1D NavierStokes model to derive a flow ratepressure (Qp) relationship for elastic
tubes using a pressurearea (pA) constitutive relation. With this pA relation, we can
essentially derive a model with two equations and two unknowns.

3
Deriving QA model
To derive our Qp relation we assume the flow to be timeindependent, allowing us to
drop the timedependent terms without any loss of generality. Thus the timeindependent,
1D NavierStokes system becomes:

Q
=0 (2)
x

Q2 A p Q
( ) + + =0 (3)
x A x A

From the equation (2), we know that Q as a function of x must be a constant. From equation
(3), take the term

Z Z
A p A p dA A p dA A p
= = dx = dA.
x A dx x A dx x A

Thus plugging into equation (3), we get the new equation to be

Q2
Z
A p Q
( + dA) + = 0 (4)
x A A A

Next, we can derive the pA constitutive relation. For this project, we will assume the
relation to be linear; therefore, the pressure is proportional to the difference of the cross
sectional area and the reference area:

p = (A A0 )

where is the proportionality coefficient which relates to the stiffness of the tube, A is the
crosssectional area at pressure p, and A0 is our reference area at the reference pressure,
p
which we will set to be zero for this project. Hence from equation (4), A
= and so we get

A2
Z Z
A p A
dA = dA = +C
A 2

4
where C is our constant of integration. We may drop the constant of integration due to the
fact that we are taking the partial derivative with respect to x in equation (4). Now that we
have found the pA constitutive relation, we can rewrite system of equations (1) as

A + Q
=0

t x
(5)

Q + Q2 A2

) + Q

t x
( A + 2 A
=0

Thus, we have obtained a system of two equations with two unknowns: Q(x, t) and A(x, t).

Analytical Solution

As stated before, we will assume the flow to be timeindependent. Thus, consider the
following system of firstorder ordinary differential equations:

dQ = 0


dx
(6)
d ( Q2 + A2
Q


dx A 2
) + A
=0

From the first ODE in the system we know that Q(x) = c, where c 0 is some constant.
Therefore, we can rewrite the second equation in the system and solve for an analytical
solution
d Q2 A2 Q
( + )+ =0
dA A 2 A
Q2 A dA Q
= ( + ) + =0
A2 dx A
dA Q
= = Q2
dx A + A2

dA QA
= =
dx Q2 + A3

Q2 + A3
= dA = dx
QA

5
Integrating both sides we get

Q2 ln (A) 3
A3
x= +C
Q

where C is our constant of integration. Consider the boundary condition A = Ain at x = 0,

where Ain is the cross-sectional area at the inlet of the tube. Using this condition we get
that

Q2 ln (Ain ) + A3
3 in
C=
Q

Q2 ln (A/Ain ) 3
(A3 A3in )
= x = (7)
Q

For practicality, we can simplify this to reduce the number of variables. Thus, consider the
boundary condition A = Aout at x = L, where L is the length of the tube and Aout is the
crosssectional outlet of the tube. Hence applying our boundary condition we get

Q2 ln (Aout /Ain ) 3
(A3out A3in )
L= (8)
Q

3
= ln (Aout /Ain )Q2 + LQ + (A A3in ) = 0 (9)
3 out

where (9) is a quadratic in Q. Therefore, using the quadratic formula we get the solution

q

L 2 L2 + 4 ln (Aout /Ain ) 3 (A3out A3in )
Q= (10)
2 ln (Aout /Ain )

which is a real solution for Aout Ain . For a physically-consistent flow in the direction of
the pressure gradient we take the root

q

L + 2 L2 + 4 ln (Aout /Ain ) 3 (A3out A3in )
Q= (11)
2 ln (Aout /Ain )

6
Finite Difference Implementation

To implement the model numerically, we will discretize the system using an implicit finite
difference method. Take A(xi ) = Ai , Q(xi ) = Qi , i = 1, ..., N , then the discretized system is

Qi+1 Qi1
= 0 = Qi+1 = Qi (Central Finite Difference) (12)
2x
 
1 Qi+1 Ai+1 Qi Ai
Ai+1 = Ai + x Q2i+1 + A3i+1
+ Q2i + A3i
(CrankNicolson Scheme) (13)
2

where both are secondorder accurate globally (i.e. O(x2 ), where x is the step size).
Since the CrankNicolson is an implicit method, we must use NewtonRaphson iterations
to solve the nonlinear equation. Thus, consider the residual for the CrankNicolson scheme
(13):
 
1 Qi+1 wi Qi Ai
R(wj ) = wj Ai x Q2i+1 + wi3
+ Q2i + A3i
(14)
2

where j represents the subiteration for the NewtonRaphson iterations and wj+1 = wj +w.
To reach convergence we want our residual to R(wj ) 0. Thus, we need to find the
correction w to the initial guess for Ai+1 . To do this we apply NewtonRaphson iterations.
Therefore, take some initial guess Ai = w0 . We then calculate the residual R(wj ) and solve
the nonlinear residual equation
R(wj+1 ) = 0 (15)

= R(wj + w) = 0

R 
= R(wj ) +  w = 0
w wj
R 
=  w = R(wj )
w wj
R(wj )
= w =  (16)
R 
w 
wj

7
where
 
R  1 Qi+1 (Q2i+1 + wj3 ) 3 Qi+1 wj3
wj = 1 x (Q2i+1 + wj3 )2
+
(Q2i+1 + wj3 )2
(17)
w 2

Thus, using (16) we can find the next wj+1 in the iteration. We also want to check if the
residual R(wj ) < , where  is some chosen tolerance, in which case we can stop the iterations.

Stability Analysis

To determine the stability of the scheme we take f (A, x) = A, where C. Therefore

substituting into (13) we get

 
1
Ai+1 = Ai + x Ai+1 + Ai (18)
2

1 1
= Ai+1 = Ai + xAi+1 + xAi
2 2
1 1
= Ai+1 xAi+1 = Ai + xAi
2 2

= Ai+1 (2 x) = (2 + x)Ai
 2 + x 
= Ai+1 = Ai
2 x
 2 + x i
= Ai = A0
2 x
2+x
where A0 is the initial condition and i = 1, ..., N . Take = 2x
to be the growth factor.
Therefore, the scheme is stable if || 1 for any x > 0 with Re() 0; in fact, the scheme
is unconditionally stable.

8
Results

From the analytical solution (11) we obtain a relation between the flow rate and pressure
drop, which is similar to a Poiseuillelike flow for rigid tubes. However, unlike a flow that
follows Poiseuilles law where the flow rate depends on the pressure difference, the flow rate
obtain in our solution depends only on the inlet and outlet pressures defined by the inlet
and outlet crosssectional areas. Thus, at relatively low pressures the flow can be described
as a quasilinear, Poiseuillelike flow implying that the flow is almost proportional to the
pressure difference at the inlet and outlet. However, this linearity begins to disappear as
the inlet pressure rises making the flow rate become more dependent on the actual inlet and
outlet pressures rather than the pressure difference.

1000
case 1
900 case 2
case 3
800

700
pressure (Pa)

600

500

400

300

200

100

0
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1
axial coordinate (m)

9
 Therefore, implementing our model numerically we obtain results for pressure vs axial
coordinate for three sample cases: 1) inlet pressure pin = 900 Pa and outlet pressure pout =
200 Pa; 2) inlet pressure pin = 700 Pa and outlet pressure pout = 400 Pa; 3) inlet pressure
pin = 500 Pa and outlet pressure pout = 100 Pa. The following parameters were used to
obtain the results: = 1060 kg/m3 , = 0.0035 Pa.s, = 1.3333, = 5 106 Pa/m2 , and
x [0, 1].

Conclusion

In this project, we looked to model arterial blood flow using the NavierStokes equations.
The widely used onedimensional NavierStokes model for rigid tubes was used and was
extended for elastic tubes by using a linear pA constitutive relation. We therefore obtained
a QA model with the only unknowns being Q(x, t) and A(x, t). Assuming the flow to be
timeindependent we were able to reduce the system of partial differential equations to a
system of firstorder ordinary differential equations. The system was solved analytically
as well as numerically by implementing the CrankNicolson scheme with NewtonRaphson
iterations. All in all, the study of blood flow is an important and interesting topic in science.
Blood is an essentially part of the human body, and studies like these give us insight to the
dynamics of blood within the body.

10
References
[1] L. Formaggia; D. Lamponi; A. Quarteroni. One-dimenisonal models for blood flow in
arteries. Journal of Engineering Mathematics, 47: 251276, 2003.

[2] M.S. Olufsen; C.S. Peskin; W.Y. Kim; E.M. Pedersen; A. Nadim; J. Larsen. Numerical
Simulation and Experimental Validation of Blood Flow in Arteries with Structured-Tree
Outflow Conditions. Annals of Biomedical Engineering, 28(11): 12811299, 2000.

[3] T. Sochi. Flow of Navier-Stokes Fluids in Cylindrical Elastic Tubes.

arXiv:1304.5734v1, 2013.

[4] T. Sochi. One-Dimensional Navier-Stokes Finite Element Flow Model.

arXiv:1304.2320, 2013.

11
 Code Appendix

% BLOOD FLOW solves the one-dimensional flow model (1D Navier-Stokes) for
% blood flowing in an artery
%==========================================================================
a = 1.333; % alpha (momentum flux)
p = 1060; % rho (fluid density)
r = 5*10^6; % gamma (proportionality coefficient)
m = 0.0035; % mu (dynamic viscosity)
v = m/p; % (kinematic viscosity)
k = 2*pi*a*v/(a-1); % kappa (viscosity friction)
rad = 0.1; % radius of tube (m)
dx = 0.05; % step size
N = 1/dx; % number of nodes
x = 0:dx:1; % grid

% find volumetric flow-rate (Finite Difference):

Q(1) = 0.166; % initial flow-rate (m^3/s)
for i = 1:N % flow-rate constant for all x
Q(i+1) = Q(i);
end

% find cross-sectional area (Crank-Nicolson):

A(1) = pi*rad^2; % initial cross-sectional area
w(1) = A(1) + dx;
R(1) = w(1) - A(1) - 0.5*dx*((k*Q(1)*w(1))/((a*Q(1)^2) - ...
-(r/p)*(w(1)^3))) + ...
+((k*Q(1)*A(1))/(a*Q(1)^2 - (r/p)*(A(1)^3))); % residual

12
Rp(1) = 1 - 0.5*(-k*Q(1)*(a*Q(1) + (r/p)*w(1)^3)/(a*Q(1)^2 - ...
- (r/p)*w(1)^3)^2); % derivative of residual
dw(1) = -R(1)\Rp(1);
flag = 0;
if R(1) <= 10^-6
flag = 1;
end
for i = 1:N
w(i+1) = w(i) + dw(i);
A(i+1) = A(i) + 0.5*dx*((k*Q(i)*w(i))/((a*Q(i)^2) - ...
-(r/p)*(w(i)^3))) + ...
+((k*Q(i)*A(i))/(a*Q(i)^2 - (r/p)*(A(i)^3))); % Crank-Nicolson

% Newton-Raphson iterations
R(i+1) = w(i+1) - A(i+1) - 0.5*dx*((k*Q(i+1)*w(i+1))/((a*Q(i+1)^2) - ...
-(r/p)*(w(i+1)^3))) + ...
+((k*Q(i+1)*A(i+1))/(a*Q(i+1)^2 - (r/p)*(A(i+1)^3))); % residual
Rp(i+1) = 1 - 0.5*((-k*Q(i+1)*(a*Q(i+1) + (r/p)*w(i+1)^3)+...
+ 2*w(i+1)^3*k*Q(i+1))/(a*Q(i+1)^2 - ...
- (r/p)*w(i+1)^3)^2); % derivative of residual
dw(i+1) = -R(i+1)\Rp(i+1);

if R(i+1) <= 10^-6

flag = 1;
end
end

13
% pressure-area constitutive relation:
for i = 2:N+1
pr1(1) = 900;
pr1(i) = pr1(1) + 1.77*r*(A(i) - A(1));
pr2(1) = 700;
pr2(i) = pr2(1) + r*(A(i) - A(1));
pr3(1) = 500;
pr3(i) = pr3(1) + r*(A(i) - A(1));
end
figure
plot(x,pr1,k-o)
hold on
plot(x,pr2,k-d)
plot(x,pr3,k-s)
hold off
xlabel(axial coordinate (m))
ylabel(pressure (Pa))
legend(case 1, case 2, case 3)
ylim([0 1000])

14