Hey my sexy internet homies lt;3: I need help on artificial valves. I need to know the following things:How do the properties of the materials artifical heart valves are made from make them useful?Explain how the structure of the technology is related to the function that it needs to perform.Thanks!!
There are three of these things: the caged-ball which utilizes a metal cage to house a metal ball, tilting-disc valves, which have a single circular occluder controlled by a metal strut. They are made of a metal ring covered by a tissue, into which the suture threads are stitched, in order to keep the valve in place once implanted and there's bileaflet valves, which consist of two semicircular leaflets that rotate about struts attached to the valve housing which is the most recent type, eh? So heart valves are considered to be extremely durable. They're made of either pyrolytic carbon or titanium coated with pyrolytic carbon, and the sewing ring cuff is Teflon or polyester or dracon (probably dacron :P). They key to the materials chosen is durability because of the constant fluid flow. I see this as pure engineering, not medicine, specifically fluid mechanics: like if there are rare complications for example thrombus formation is a debilitating side effect of high shear stresses created by design of the valves. Ideal heart valve from an engineering view would produce minimal pressure drops of course have small regurgitation volumes because it's supposed to minimize turbulence and regulate the flow.
