[home] [Personal Program] [Help]

---

Session: Vascular - II
Session starts: Friday 27 January, 11:30
Presentation starts: 11:45
Room: Room 559

---

Hanneke Crielaard (Erasmus Medical Center)
Tamar Wissing (TU Eindhoven / Erasmus MC)
Su Guvenir Torun (Erasmus Medical Center)
Pablo de Miguel Muñoz (Erasmus Medical Center/TU delft)
Gert-Jan Kremers (Erasmus Medical Center)
Frank Gijsen (Erasmus Medical Center/TU delft)
Ali Akyildiz (Erasmus Medical Center/TU delft)
Kim van der Heiden (Erasmus Medical Center)

Abstract:
Stroke is commonly initiated by rupture of the atherosclerotic plaque fibrous cap in a carotid artery. However, cap rupture mechanisms are not well understood yet. Understanding the impact of structural components of the cap on its local mechanics may provide critical insights into plaque rupture. We tissue engineered collagenous plaque analogs [1], to scrutinize the reciprocal relationships between composition and mechanics. We aim to unravel plaque rupture mechanics by studying local mechanical properties and collagen orientation in a tissue-engineered plaque model. Ten collagenous cap analogs with a soft inclusion (SI), mimicking the plaque lipid core, were created [1]. Analogs were exposed to multiphoton microscopy with second harmonic generation to obtain local fiber orientation, using a fiber orientation analysis tool (FibLab). After imaging, analogs were exposed to uniaxial tensile tests until full rupture. Local (Green-Lagrange) strains under tensile stretching were measured through DIC analysis using the software Ncorr [2]. Collagen fibers were mainly oriented in the circumferential direction (y-direction). In the center of the samples, larger deviations in fiber orientation from the y- direction and a more dispersed fiber architecture were found compared to the edges. Rupture was found to initiate near high tensile strain regions in the soft inclusion (mimicking the lipid core), suggesting that rupture initiation does not always occur at the luminal surface of an atherosclerotic plaque, as is generally assumed. [1] Wissing TB, Van der Heiden K, Serra SM, Smits AIPM, Bouten CV, Gijsen FJH . Tissue-engineered collagenous fibrous cap models to systematically elucidate atherosclerotic plaque rupture. Scientific Reports 12(1), (2022) [2]. Blaber J, Adair B, Antoniou A, Ncorr: Open-Source 2D Digital Image Correlation Matlab Software. Experimental Mechanics, 55(6), 1105–1122 (2015).