New cardiovascular simulator for coarctation of the aorta and coarctation-related devices

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COMPANY BACKGROUND: ViVitro Labs Inc. is a Canadian-based company that has providedcardiovascular and endovascular device test equipment and laboratory testing to a global market. It is the onlyCanadian company making cardiovascular and endovascular device test simulators. The ViVitro PulseDuplicator system is the world's most cited and used in vitro hemodynamic testing system for commercial heartand valve devices. THE NEED: Although the ViVitro simulators have the capability of testing somecardiovascular diseases and cardiovascular devices, they do not have the capability of testing the mostimportant and common congenital cardiovascular pathology: coarctation of the aorta (COA). COA is anarrowing of the aorta with many morphologic variants. A physical COA simulator is much needed fordesigning, developing, evaluating and optimizing COA-related devices, especially the emerging vasculartranscatheter stents, and for developing novel diagnostic methods for COA. COLLABORATIONOPPORTUNITY: This collaboration allows ViVitro to investigate feasibility of adding the capability of testingof COA and COA-related devices to its product portfolio using an innovative approach. METHODOLOGY:This project uses clinical imaging data, image processing algorithms, and a unique computational fluiddynamics and lumped parameter modeling framework to provide details of the physiological pulsatile flow andpressures through the heart and the circulatory system. This information is required for developing andvalidating the setup to simulate the physiological condition. OPPORTUNITY: The new simulator can servetesting needs of medical-device companies that want to introduce new devices for COA. This simulator is alsovery attractive for academic research worldwide. This is particularly important because the industrial focus onvascular transcatheter stents and related devices is rapidly growing and the number of companies developingnew vascular devices is greatly increasing. The new simulator can help ViVitro Labs to differentiate in theinternational market of endovascular device simulators and can create new jobs in Canada.