Mathematical and numerical modeling of atherosclerotic plaque progression based on fluid-structure interaction

In this work we propose a mathematical and numerical model to describe the early stages of atherosclerotic plaque formation, which is based on the interaction of processes with different spatial and temporal scales. A fluid–structure interaction problem, used to describe the cardiovascular mechanics arising between blood and the artery wall, is coupled to a set of differential problems describing the evolution of solute concentrations. In order to manage the multiscale-in-space nature of the involved processes, we propose a suitable numerical strategy based on the splitting and sequential solution of the coupled problem. We present some preliminary numerical results and investigate the effects of geometry, model parameters and coupling strategy on plaque growth.