Nasal airflow and odorant transport: a prerequisite for normal olfaction

空气/气味流向嗅觉感受器部位的机械阻塞可能是嗅觉的主要原因 鼻-鼻窦疾病患者的损失。不幸的是，量化不同鼻腔的功能影响 声学鼻腔测量、鼻腔测压或CT扫描对梗阻和随后的手术结果的影响 是不够的。研究表明，这些现有的客观测量与 患者的主观症状。 最近开发的计算流体动力学(CFD)建模技术显示出 量化位置依赖的、阻塞引起的鼻部气流模式和气味的变化 粘膜沉积，并有可能表征其对患者嗅觉的功能影响 功能。这项建议的目标是建立鼻腔气流模式和气味传递率的基线。 在健康受试者中，由此推测临床嗅觉丧失的传导机制 患者可以在未来得到验证。 在未来，这样的建模技术可能会提供手术过程的定量评估和 重要的术前指南，以优化气流和气味输送在人的鼻子。

Mechanical obstruction of air/odorant flow to olfactory receptor sites may be a primary cause of olfactory loss in nasal-sinus disease patients. Unfortunately, quantifying the functional impact of various nasal obstruction and the subsequent surgical outcomes using acoustic rhinometry, rhinomanometry or CT scans is inadequate. Studies have shown a poor correlation between these existing objective measurements with patients' subjective symptoms. Recently developed computational fluid dynamic (CFD) modeling techniques have shown promise for quantifying the location-dependent, obstruction-induced changes in nasal airflow pattern and odorant mucosal deposition and have the potential to characterize their functional impact on patients' olfactory function. The goal of this proposal is to establish a baseline in nasal airflow pattern and odorant delivery rate among healthy subjects, from which the putative conductive mechanisms of olfactory loss among clinical patients can be verified in future. In the future, such modeling techniques may provide quantitative evaluation of surgical procedures and an important pre-operative guide to optimize airflow and odorant delivery in human nose.