Multi-physics modeling of brain waste clearance by the cerebrospinal fluid: a polytopal discontinuous Galerkin approach

Ivan Fumagalli

Dipartimento di Matematica, Laboratorio MOX, Politecnico di Milano

Thursday 28th September 2023

15:10:00

Aula Saleri

Neurodegenerative disorders are an increasing health and societal issue worldwide. Many of these diseases (such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s) are related to an impairment of the waste clearance system in the brain. Indeed, in physiological conditions, brain activity produces waste proteins that are collected and removed by the Cerebrospinal Fluid (CSF), the main component of the glymphatic system. In this talk, I present a multiphysics model coupling Stokes equations for the CSF flow in the brain ventricles and subarachnoid space with dynamic Multiple-Network Poroelastic (MPE) equations for the perfusion of the brain tissue by CSF and blood [Corti et al. 2023; Causemann et al. 2022]. The model is discretized by a discontinuous Galerkin method based on polytopal grids, which can naturally comply with the geometrical complexity of the domain. An a priori analysis of the method is provided, together with numerical tests in realistic geometries. Then, perspectives are discussed on further developments of the model, its numerical discretization, and its employment to address clinical questions.