CAREER:Exploring Structure-Function Relationships in the Human Airways Through Fluid Mechanics Experiments

University Of Minnesota-Twin Cities, Minneapolis MN

Investigators

Abstract

1453538 Coletti The main goal of this CAREER project is to explore how structural features of healthy and diseased airways affect the fluid mechanics of respiration. Since currently used aerosol drug delivery techniques are not efficient, the proposed work would have an impact on targeted drug delivery for respiratory diseases. It could also improve the design and manufacturing of functional implants. The proposed study of both healthy and diseased human airways can offer an understanding of the effect of behaviors such as smoking on the fluid structure interactions of airways. 3D printing of realistic airways significantly increases the broader impact of this research, because it offers a more direct connection to actual airways, and how they are changed by disease. The inclusion of particle deposition is also important because of its potential impact on inhalation therapies. The proposed educational activities combine engineering, physiology, and advanced imaging, such as the development of a 3D printed virtual tour of the lung based on MRI imaging as outreach to the public. The PI proposes to address a rather significant bio-inspired fluid dynamics problem with an arsenal of state-of-the-art tools: MRI imaging and PIV velocimetry to characterize the flow experimentally and 3D printing for fabricating models to study realistic geometries for healthy and diseased human airways. The experimental system has already been manufactured so that important dimensionless groups in the model are matched to actual behavior in the human airways. The PI proposes to explore the relation between structure, defined as the morphology and the mechanical properties of the airways, and function, defined as the transport of inhaled particles.