3D Modelling Brings Heart Simulation to Life

French company Dassualt Systemes has announced the upcoming commercial release of the world-first 3D simulated “living heart” model which will assist researchers and medical professionals in testing a variety of diagnostics and therapeutic treatments on the human heart in a completely safe environment.
The “Living Heart Project” model represents a baseline healthy heart, which can be used to study congenital defects or heart disease by modifying the shape and tissue properties in an easy-to-use software editor. In addition, medical devices can be inserted into the simulator to study their influence on cardiac function, validate their efficacy, and predict reliability under a range of operating conditions. For example, coronary stents can be evaluated for optimal type, size, and placement location to achieve the best performance.
The project is a collaboration of 45 current members to build its models while protecting the intellectual property of each member. Members include regulatory science focused organizations such as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Medical Device Innovation Consortium (MDIC), as well as technology providers, cardiologists, medical device manufacturers and hospitals such as St. Jude Medical and Mayo Clinic.
The “Living Heart” model includes well-defined anatomic details of the heart as well as proximal vasculature, such as the aortic arch, pulmonary artery, and superior vena cava (SVC). The dynamic response of the heart model is governed by realistic electrical, structural, and fluid (blood) flow physics.
In addition to the general availability of the heart simulator, the members of the “Living Heart Project” have collectively identified the highest priority cardiovascular applications for it and associated technological advancements which will help shape the functionality of future versions of the simulator.
Learn more about the Living Heart Project