Vertebral arteries

Abstract

During the investigation period, which lasted almost four months, we made a research of the vertebral arteries in the posterior part of the head in children. During this time we investigated the size, diameter and the blood flow in those arteries to make a model and a completed a system to simulate the vertebral arteries in the human head. We built the model with the real dimensions of the human arteries and used a mixture of 60% glycerin + 40% water to simulate blood because it had almost the same viscosity. We worked with a positive displacement pump that simulated the heartbeat with an amplitude and frequency similar to that of the heart. We also worked with photodetectors, which were the most important equipment of the experiment, for determining the concentration of drug (in our case we used dye) flowing through the probes and sending signals to a computer program that displays the results in the monitor. The process allows knowing the exact drug concentration (dye in this case) flowing through each artery. This approach has yet to be tested in animals to determine its usefulness.