Transient Thermal Modeling and Simulation Environment

描述(申请人提供)：许多生物医学应用涉及在均匀结构中使用能量沉积，例如激光手术、低温外科手术和射频消融。在许多情况下，当能源被脉冲时，可以实现许多优点。没有商业软件包可以帮助临床医生确定这些能量干预的方向、持续时间和大小。特别是，现有的预测工具没有考虑与激光与薄组织相互作用相关的影响。虽然众所周知的近似模型，如扩散模型，充分考虑了与厚组织样本的相互作用，但它们不能准确地模拟与边界相互作用变得重要的薄组织相关的影响。此外，当脉冲能量以超高频在组织中沉积时，组织中随后的传导不再遵循傅立叶传导定律，从而使模拟进一步复杂化。该项目的具体目标是开发一个通用的商业软件建模和仿真环境，该环境将能够准确评估生物医学应用中的热传递，涉及跨薄到厚组织层的组织中的能量沉积以及超快到连续波激光，包括那些非傅立叶导热很重要的情况。我们的热建模和仿真环境将为临床医生和生物医学研究人员提供一个易于使用的工具，以准确规划和了解各种基于脉冲和非脉冲能量沉积的临床程序。在第一阶段，我们将开发一个独立软件包的一般框架，将通过与实验数据、解析解和蒙特卡洛模拟的比较进行演示。在第二阶段，我们将开发一个完整和强大的包，具有直观的图形用户界面、精致的模型，以及与我们的合作者共同开发的极大扩展的物业数据库。我们还将进行适当的实验，并与临床医生密切合作，以验证潜在的模型和数值方案，并收集更多所需的材料特性。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Many biomedical applications involve the use of energy deposition into in homogeneous structures, such as laser surgery, cryosurgery, and RF ablation. In many cases, numerous advantages can be realized when the energy source is pulsed. No commercial software package exists to assist clinicians in determining the direction, duration, and magnitude of these energy interventions. In particular, existing predictive tools do not account for the effects associated with the laser interaction with thin tissues. While well-known approximations, such as the Diffusion Model, adequately account for interactions with thick tissue samples, they do not accurately model the effects associated with thin tissues where interactions with boundaries becomes important. Furthermore, when pulsed energy is deposited in tissue at ultra-high frequency, the subsequent conduction in the tissue no longer adheres to Fourier's conduction law, further complicating simulations. The specific aim of this project is to develop a general, commercial software modeling and simulation environment that will enable accurate assessment of heat transfer for biomedical applications involving energy deposition in tissues across the spectrums of thin to thick tissue layers and ultra-fast to continuous wave lasers, including those situations when non-Fourier heat conduction is important. Our thermal modeling and simulation environment will provide an easy-to-use tool for clinicians and biomedical researchers to plan accurately and understand a wide variety of pulsed and non-pulsed energy deposition-based clinical procedures. In Phase I, we will develop the general framework for a stand-alone software package that will be demonstrated with comparisons to experimental data, analytic solutions, and Monte Carlo simulations. In Phase II, we will develop a complete and robust package with an intuitive graphical user interface, refined models, and greatly expanded property data base developed in conjunction with our collaborators. We will also conduct appropriate experiments and work closely with clinicians to verify the underlying models and numerical schemes and gather additional required material properties.