Mechanical analysis of the ring opening test applied to human ascending aortas

Abstract

This work presents experiments, modelling and numerical simulation aimed at describing themechanical response of human ascending aortas in the ring opening test. The objective is toquantify, from the opening angles measured in the test, the residual stress distribution along theartery wall and, afterwards, how this stress pattern changes when the artery is subjected to standardphysiological pressures. The cases studied correspond to four groups including both healthy andpathological arteries. The tissues are characterized via tensile test measurements that enable toderive the material parameters of two constitutive models adopted in the present analysis. Overall,the numerical results obtained for all groups were found to be a useful data that allow to estimatethe residual stress and their influence on the vessels under normal and hypertension physiologicalconditions.