Effect of Vibration Imposition on Aortic Muscle Tissue : An Explorative Study

• Main Author: Ajgaonkar, Subodh Datta (Author)
• Other Authors: Lu, Jun (Contributor), Lowe, Andrew (Contributor)
• Format: Others
• Published: Auckland University of Technology, 2017-06-28T02:59:50Z.
• Subjects: Aorta; vibration; stress; Active forces; reduction; Thesis
• Online Access: Get fulltext

 Aorta, the main artery of the human body has a pipe like structure and is tasked with carrying and distributing the oxygenated blood to the various parts of the human body. Development of small kink or obstruction, clinically also called as the Coarctation of Aorta (CoA) is a congenital condition leading to narrowing of the aorta. This generally tends to happen to the left side of the heart. Coarctation or narrowing of the aorta leads to increase in the active forces along the walls of aorta and high blood pressure. This study tends to research the effect of vibration imposition on aorta muscle tissue to decrease the active forces along its walls and eventually lead to its relaxation. Sinusoidal vibrations are a type of smooth vibrations have shown to decrease the active forces seen muscle tissues and subsequently relax the tissue. Relaxation of other smooth tissue samples as that from Airway smooth muscle and trachea have given credence to the hypothesis. This hypothesis however has not yet been applied to the aortic smooth muscle. Thus, this research focuses on relaxation of smooth muscles - particularly those of rat aorta using smooth vibrations. The aim of the research is to find a frequency of vibrations that can relax maximally constricted rat aortic tissue and reduce active muscle forces. It can then be expanded to include various smooth muscle tissues leading to better management of cardiovascular diseases. In this study, increasing relaxation in tissues was seen with a subsequent increase in the frequency of the vibrations. The maximum relaxation seen was at 24% of initial stress for 50hz frequency. The study also shows a gradual increase in relaxation across various frequencies, starting from 10% for 20hz to 24% for 50hz. It can also be inferred from the study's result that there is a decrease in relaxation from the first vibration imposition cycle to next and thus, there is a probability of tissue fatigue. The relaxations indicate the effect sinusoidal vibrations have on the stress level and the active forces of the aorta tissue sample.