Numerical Study of Pulsating Flow Through a Tapered Artery with Stenosis

Numerical simulations of pulsating blood flow through models of stenotic and tapered arteries have been performed to investigate the distributions of the wall shear stress. In this paper, a mathematical model of a rigid tapered artery with axially symmetric stenosis is established. The incompressible Navier-Stokes equations are solved numerically by using the finite difference method. The effects of tapering and stenosis are considered. The results show that stenosis disturbs the flow field at the vicinity of the stenosis, especially at the throat and downstream, and easily leads to the formation of a flow separation region in the post-stenotic region.