Uncertainty quantification applied to hemodynamic simulations of thoracic aorta aneurysms: Sensitivity to inlet conditions

In this work, the numerical simulation of the blood flow inside a patient specific aorta in presence of an aneurysm is considered. A systematic sensitivity analysis of numerical predictions to the shape of the inlet flow rate waveform is carried out. In particular, two parameters are selected to describe the inlet waveform: the stroke volume and the period of the cardiac cycle. In order to limit the number of hemodynamic simulations required, we used a stochastic method based on the generalized polynomial chaos (gPC) approach, in which the selected parameters are considered as random variables with a given probability distribution. The uncertainty is propagated through the numerical model and a continuous response surface of the output quantities of interest in the parameter space can be recovered through a “surrogate” model. For both selected uncertain parameters, we first assumed uniform Probability Density Functions (PDFs) on a given variation range, and then we used clinical data to construct more accurate beta PDFs. In all cases, the two input parameters appeared to have a significant influence on wall shear stresses, confirming the need of using patient-specific inlet conditions.