Supercomputing is helping make discoveries not only in the vast recesses of space, but in the micro chambers of the heart.
Dr Thomas Franz, of the Cardiovascular Research Unit, Chris Barnard Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery, University of Cape Town, is using high-performance computing to explore the treatment and prevention of cardiovascular diseases and heart attacks (medical term: myocardial infarction).
Franz notes that cardiovascular diseases will become the leading cause of death by 2020, superseding high-profile infectious diseases such as HIV, TB, and malaria.
He explains that supercomputers enable researchers to study the biomechanics of heart attacks, and potential treatment therapies, in far more detail than what's possible with standard computers.
“This includes the representation of the structure of the heart muscle and injected biomaterial at microscopic scale, the complex mechanical behaviour of cardiac muscle tissue and the heart overall.”
Franz's research focuses on a specific therapy - glycol-hydrogel - and its effect on damaged heart tissue. “Biomaterial injections have been shown to have a positive effect on the infarcted heart, but it is not well understood what causes the positive effect, and how this effect can be improved,” he explains.
The team headed by Franz has developed computational models of healthy hearts and damaged hearts injected with the gel, and are busy completing a detailed study of the microscopic distribution of the gel in the damaged heart wall.
“We have also completed the three-dimensional reconstruction of a human heart in a computational model in which we currently implement models for activation of the heart muscle.”
The project runs over a period of three years, starting on 1 July last year, and running to 31 June 2013. Franz adds that the research will continue beyond this date.
In the short term, Franz hopes to establish realistic computational models, including the representation of attacks in certain regions of the heart, as well as the injected biomaterials.
Eventually, this could lead to the development of new modelling tools for the electric activities of the heart, and improve the understanding of the biomechanics involved in heart attacks. It could also contribute to new or improved therapies for heart attacks and help prevent heart failure after attacks, based on biomaterial injections, he adds.
“We hope to improve the understanding of the effects of such therapies and the mechanics of myocardial infarction, and so provide a basis for more effective therapies for heart attacks and heart failure.”
Franz believes supercomputing can have a multi-faceted role in cardiovascular research. While his project focuses on computational modelling of the biomechanics of the heart, other potential applications include modelling the regeneration of cardiovascular tissue, and the development of regenerative implants.
“Apart from the role in biomedical aspects of cardiovascular research, supercomputing enables a new route for inter-disciplinary human capacity and scarce skills development by bringing together computer scientists, biomedical researchers, biologists, clinicians and others,” notes Franz.
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