Flow in a mechanical bileaflet heart valve at laminar and near-peak systole flow rates: CFD simulations and experiments.

Time-accurate, fully 3D numerical simulations and particle image velocity laboratory experiments are carried out for flow through a fully open bileaflet mechanical heart valve under steady (nonpulsatile) inflow conditions. Flows at two different Reynolds numbers, one in the laminar regime and the other turbulent (near-peak systole flow rate), are investigated. A direct numerical simulation is carried out for the laminar flow case while the turbulent flow is investigated with two different unsteady statistical turbulence modeling approaches, unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (URANS) and detached-eddy simulation (DES) approach. For both the laminar and turbulent cases the computed mean velocity profiles are in good overall agreement with the measurements. For the turbulent simulations, however, the comparisons with the measurements demonstrate clearly the superiority of the DES approach and underscore its potential as a powerful modeling tool of cardiovascular flows at physiological conditions. The study reveals numerous previously unknown features of the flow.