CardioLab

Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

CARDIOLAB: A VIRTUAL LABORATORY FOR THE

ANALYSIS OF HUMAN CIRCULATORY SYSTEM
Alher Mauricio Hernandez1, Gino Pierfranco Herrera1, Miguel Angel Maanas2, Ramon
Costa-Castell3
Bioelectronics and Clinical Engineering Research (GIBIC), Universidad de Antioquia (UdeA), Colombia
2
Department of Automatic Control (ESAII), Biomedical Engineering Research Center (CREB)
3
Institute of Industrial and Control Engineering (IOC), Universitat Polit`ecnica de Catalunya (UPC), Spain
1

GIBIC Bioelectronic and Clinical Engineering

I O C Instit ute o f Industrial and Control Engineering

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Content

I.
II.
III.

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Introduction
Objectives
The Cardiovascular System
Model description
Cardiovascular stimuli

IV. Virtual Lab Description

Tool development
Interactive elements
Plots and examples

V. Conclusions

Conclusions

CardioLab

Introduction

Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Biomedical Engineering (BME) is the

engineering sciences and technology to
biology. The interdisciplinary nature of this
interplay and overlapping of interest and
engineering and biologic points of view.

Conclusions

application of
medicine and
activity implies
effort between

Engineers do not need a deep knowledge of certain medical

topics (and vice versa).
BME is different to other engineering
areas in the sense of obtaining
results from experimental procedures
and reproducing real physiological
situations.

ChristianDarkin/SciencePhotoLibrary

CardioLab

Introduction

Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

It is very difficult and expensive

to interact with the human
being body and even
dangerous in certain situations.
BSIP,VILLAREAL/SciencePhotoLibrary

The field of BME includes many career areas, and one of

them is the application of engineering system analysis
(physiologic modeling, simulation, and control) to biologic
problems.
The Autonomic Nervous system
interacts with the cardiovascular
system in order to control the
heart rate and force of heart
contraction, constriction and
dilatation of blood vessels.
RogerHarris/SciencePhotoLibrary

CardioLab

Objectives

Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

Developing a virtual laboratory to study the

cardiovascular system and the effect of stimuli
applied to the autonomic nerve system.
Proposing the use of Virtual Labs in the study
of cardiovascular system in BME programs, in
order to overcome the drawbacks of interaction
with human body.
Designing a Virtual Lab in a visually attractive
and interactive way.

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

The Cardiovascular System

1. Model Description (I)

The cardiovascular system
intermediate processes:

is

Ursino [1998] and Cavalcanti and Belardinelli [1996]

structured

in

different

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

The Cardiovascular System

1. Model Description (II)

The central autonomic control determines the total -sympathetic,
ftas, -sympathetic, ftbs, and parasympathetic, ftp, influences on heart
rate and peripheral resistance from the baroreflexes, chemoreflexes
and lung stretch receptors reflexes.

Autonomic
control
afferent signals, ftas,
ftbs and ftp allow
simulation of different
stimuli related with the
sympathetic
and
parasympathetic
systems.

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

The Cardiovascular System

1. Model Description (III)

Sino Auricular Node (S.A.) translates changes in -sympathetic, and
parasympathetic, efferent activity into changes in Heart Period (HP):

0.58s

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

The Cardiovascular System

1. Model Description (IV)

The -sympathetic nerves control the peripheral vascular activities.
During
hypotension
or
hypertension,
vasoconstriction
or
vasodilatation occurs to prevent further decreasing or increasing in
the blood pressure.

This subsystem is
using a first-order
system:

modeled
dynamic

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

The Cardiovascular System

1. Model Description (V)

The stroke volume and the heart period determine the cardiac output
(CO) whereas arterial blood pressure (abp) is modulated by the
vasculature and cardiac output.
The model determines abp by means of the following expression:

Where Cart represents the

Arterial Compliance and RTPR
the
Total
Peripheral
Resistance.
The stroke volume (SV)
is determined by the
venous return (Vn), the
heart period and the
heart contractility (Cn)

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

The Cardiovascular System

1. Cardiovascular Stimuli (I)

Almost every process that affects the autonomic control system also
affects the cardiovascular system through the vagal and sympathetic
activity. Five stimuli are considered in Cardiolab:
Exercise: Heart rate (HR) and stroke volume (SV ) increase during
exercise, which produces an increase in cardiac output.
Cholinergic intoxication: Produces one increase of parasympathetic
activity and produces also an increase of the cardiac period and
hypotension.
Caffeine: Xanthines such as caffeine and theophylline block
adenosine receptors increasing the activity that produces
vasoconstriction, higher heart rate and increased heart contraction
force.
Hemorrhage: An acute blood volume loss (10% of total or more),
modifies the systemic arterial pressure, cardiac output and total
systemic resistance.
Panic: The autonomic system switched to an alert situation
characterized by higher and sympathetic activity.

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

Virtual Lab Description

1. Tool Development
Presented software application is based on Easy Java
Simulations (EJS), an open source java-based tool that allows
creating interactive dynamic simulations.

EASY JAVA

The model is based on

MATLAB/Simulink.
The simulation runs in
Simulink while is controlled
by Easy Java.

SIMULINK
Model (Ursino et al., 1998)

The interface to the user has

been designed and
implemented in EJS.

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

Virtual Lab Description

2. Interactive Elements (I)

In the interactive module parameters can be changed by means
of sliders and tabs in order to simulate different ventilatory
conditions.

A multisignal scope can be seen when this option is selected by

the user.

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab Description

2. Interactive Elements (II)

From
Autonomic
Control

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

Virtual Lab Description

3. Plots and Examples (I)

One of the two kinds of plots are shown when the corresponding tab of
signal scope is selected by the user:

A change from normal conditions (Toxicity Level = 0mg) to a specific

amount of pesticides in contact with the human body (Toxicity Level =
5mg) is produced at 60 seconds in order to simulate a cholinergic
intoxication.

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

Virtual Lab Description

3. Plots and Examples (II)

After cholinergic intoxication begins, blood pressure and cardiac output
remain in a lightly lower value (see the figure on the right).

In order to simulate the treatment of this intoxication, a second stimulus

is applied at 180s: the concentration of pesticides = 0 and the gain of the
parasympathetic system is eliminated in order to produce a blockade
(gain = 0) related with the Atropine administration.

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab Description

4. Cardiolab Demo

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

CardioLab
Content

Introduction

Objectives

Cardiov. System

Virtual Lab.

Conclusions

Conclusions

This laboratory is completely graphic and interactive, so it can

be used to illustrate the behavior of human cardiovascular
system under certain stimuli.
CardioLab allows the students and researchers obtain
sensations and experience that would be very difficult
otherwise because of the difficulties in performing
experimental human studies.
The use of virtual laboratories and interactivity in BME has
proved to be an efficient way to shortcut the learning process
an improve the students capabilities.
The tool has been built combining MATLAB/Simulink and EJS.
While MATLAB/Simulink allows to implement complex models
in straightforward manner, EJS allows to design attractive
views and introduce interactivity easily.