Quantifying cerebral blood flow in the whole brain in a diffusion model with multiple sources from cerebrovascular structures

Abstract

Various imaging techniques have been developed to visualize the three-dimensional structures of the brain and cerebrovascular vessels. Recently, several imaging techniques have allowed the measurement of cerebral blood flow (CBF) in the whole brain. Despite the rapid development of imaging techniques, numerical methods of predicting CBF are still challenging, due to the complexity of cerebrovascular structure modeling at the clinical level. Additionally, simulation models for oxygen and mass transport from the vasculature to tissues are not available at the clinical level due to the lack of knowledge in the field of microvascular transport. In this study, we propose a computational method to quantify CBF in the whole brain, linking cerebrovascular transport, and brain tissue perfusion. To simplify the linking process, the microvascular transport of blood was treated as a diffusion process. The concentration of CBF was predicted using our novel computational method. Furthermore, we investigated changes in CBF in cases where the blood supply to specific areas of the brain were blocked by disrupted vessels.