Computational Fluid Dynamics Analysis of Blood Flow in Stenosed Carotid Arteries: Effects of Narrowing Severity on Hemodynamic Pressure and Wall Shear Stress

Narrowing of the carotid arteries by plaque deposition is a leading cause of stroke and heart disease in humans. The mechanical forces exerted by blood on the artery wall, particularly wall shear stress (WSS) and pressure, play important roles in both plaque growth and artery wall rupture. This project uses computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to simulate pulsatile blood flow in simplified carotid-like tubes with three levels of stenosis (75%, 50%, and 25% reduction in cross-sectional area) to investigate how narrowing severity affects outlet pressure fluctuations and WSS distributions. Preliminary results from two cases (75% and 50% stenosis) show that increasing stenosis depth enhances both the pulsatile pressure drop and the extremes of wall shear stress at the throat, consistent with clinical observations linking severe stenoses to cardiovascular risk.