Finite element modeling of flow/compression-induced deformation of alginate scaffolds for bone tissue engineering

Trauma or degenerative diseases such as osteonecrosis may determine bone loss whose recover is promised by a "tissue engineering“ approach. This strategy involves the use of stem cells, grown onboard of adequate biocompatible/bioreabsorbable hosting templates (usually defined as scaffolds) and cultured in specific dynamic environments afforded by differentiation-inducing actuators (usually defined as bioreactors) to produce implantable tissue constructs. The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate, by finite element modeling of flow/compression-induced deformation, alginate scaffolds intended for bone tissue engineering. This work was conducted at the Biomechanics Laboratory of the Institute of Biomedical and Neural Engineering of the Reykjavik University of Iceland. In this respect, Comsol Multiphysics 5.1 simulations were carried out to approximate the loads over alginate 3D matrices under perfusion, compression and perfusion+compression, when varyingalginate pore size and flow/compression regimen. The results of the simulations show that the shear forces in the matrix of the scaffold increase coherently with the increase in flow and load, and decrease with the increase of the pore size. Flow and load rates suggested for proper osteogenic cell differentiation are reported.

A Reliable Downscaling of ECG Signals for the Detection of T wave Heterogeneity Features

In cardiovascular disease the definition and the detection of the ECG parameters related to repolarization dynamics in post MI patients is still a crucial unmet need. In addition, the use of a 3D sensor in the implantable medical devices would be a crucial mean in the assessment or prediction of Heart Failure status, but the inclusion of such feature is limited by hardware and firmware constraints. The aim of this thesis is the definition of a reliable surrogate of the 500 Hz ECG signal to reach the aforementioned objective. To evaluate the worsening of reliability due to sampling frequency reduction on delineation performance, the signals have been consecutively down sampled by a factor 2, 4, 8 thus obtaining the ECG signals sampled at 250, 125 and 62.5 Hz, respectively. The final goal is the feasibility assessment of the detection of the fiducial points in order to translate those parameters into meaningful clinical parameter for Heart Failure prediction, such as T waves intervals heterogeneity and variability of areas under T waves. An experimental setting for data collection on healthy volunteers has been set up at the Bakken Research Center in Maastricht. A 16 – channel ambulatory system, provided by TMSI, has recorded the standard 12 – Leads ECG, two 3D accelerometers and a respiration sensor. The collection platform has been set up by the TMSI property software Polybench, the data analysis of such signals has been performed with Matlab. The main results of this study show that the 125 Hz sampling rate has demonstrated to be a good candidate for a reliable detection of fiducial points. T wave intervals proved to be consistently stable, even at 62.5 Hz. Further studies would be needed to provide a better comparison between sampling at 250 Hz and 125 Hz for areas under the T waves.

Precise Near-Field Focusing exploiting Bessel Beam Launchers for Wireless Power Transfer at millimeter waves

Wireless Power Transfer has become a promising technology to overcome the limits of wired solutions. Within this framework, the objective of this thesis is to study a WPT link at millimeter waves involving a particular type of antenna working in the radiative near-field, known as Bessel Beam (BB) Launcher. This antenna has been chosen for its peculiarity of generating a Bessel Beam which is by nature non-diffractive, showing good focusing and self-healing capabilities. In particular, a Bull-Eye Leaky Wave Antenna is designed and analysed, fed by a loop antenna and resonating at approximately 30 GHz. The structure excites a Hybrid-TE mode showing zeroth-order Bessel function over the z-component of the magnetic field. The same antenna is designed with two different dimensions, showing good wireless power transport properties. The link budgets obtained for different configurations are reported. With the aim of exploiting BB Launchers in wearable applications, a further analysis on the receiving part is conducted. For WPT wearable or implantable devices a reduced dimension of the receiver system must be considered. Therefore, an electrically large loop antenna in planar technology is modified, inserting phase shifters in order to increase the intensity of the magnetic field in its interrogation zone. This is fundamental when a BB Launcher is involved as transmitter. The loop antenna, in reception, shows a further miniaturization level since it is built such that its interrogation zone corresponds to the main beam dimension of transmitting BB Launcher. The link budget is evaluated with the new receiver showing comparable results with respect to previous configurations, showing an efficient WPT link for near-field focusing. Finally, a matching network and a full-wave rectifying circuit are attached to two of the different receiving systems considered. Further analysis will be carried out about the robustness of the square loop over biological tissues.