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Recent advancements in medical imaging techniques have enabled the accurate identification of unruptured intracranial aneurysms. To facilitate a proper patient management strategy, it is important to develop suitable mathematical models for their rupture prediction. To this end, the development of high-fidelity computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations with patient-specific boundary conditions will be useful in providing reliable hemodynamic parameters. In recent review articles, researchers have pointed out that, among several clinical and image-based indicators, morphological parameters, such as aspect ratio (AR) and size ratio (SR) of the aneurysm, correlated consistently with the rupture mechanism. However, it is not clear how these morphological indicators influence the hemodynamics-based CFD predictions. In the present work, the effect of these top-ranked morphological parameters on aneurysm hemodynamics and rupture prediction is investigated. Three patient-specific models have been used for analysis with the patient-specific inlet boundary conditions. We found that with an increase in AR and SR, the maximum value of wall shear stress (WSS) near the aneurysm neck is increased. Oscillatory shear index and relative residence time values are also increased with an increase in AR and SR. Furthermore, it was observed that an aneurysm with a multilobed structure shows complex flow, low WSS, and higher residence time over the secondary lobe. The turbulent kinetic energy and vorticity near the aneurysm neck are also increased with an increase in AR and SR.

Bifurcating vessel is a characteristic feature of biological systems such as arteries in the cardiovascular system and pulmonary airways. In cardiovascular system, the bifurcations are often asymmetric, flow is pulsatile, and the fluid, blood, shows a complex rheology. In this work, we study computationally pulsatile flow in planar symmetric and asymmetric, three-dimensional bifurcating vessels. The fluid is considered to be Newtonian as well as non-Newtonian following Carreau's model, and the results are compared. While the flow divides in the two daughter tubes equally in symmetric bifurcations, the flow distribution is time-dependent during a cardiac cycle in asymmetric bifurcations. The flow pattern changes significantly during a cardiac cycle. The secondary flow caused by a turning streamline is analyzed in terms of secondary velocity, vorticity, and helicity. Significant variation is observed in the secondary flow in a cardiac cycle. The secondary flow is observed to be stronger at the start of the diastole despite reduced flow rate. The separated flow on the outer wall causes a significant reduction in time-averaged wall shear stress, a biomarker to assess the possibility of atherosclerotic plaque development. While no significant difference is observed in the results obtained for Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids at high shear rates, for example, during systole, significant differences are observed when the shear rate is low, during diastole or in the separation region. The velocity profile for the non-Newtonian fluid is observed to be flatter than that for Newtonian fluid. Further oscillatory shearing index, relative residence time, the parameters used as biomarkers are presented.