CRIMSON: An open-source software framework for cardiovascular integrated modelling and simulation

Abstract

In this work, we describe the CRIMSON (CardiovasculaR Integrated Modelling and SimulatiON) software environment. CRIMSON provides a powerful, customizable and user-friendly system for performing three-dimensional and reduced-order computational haemodynamics studies via a pipeline which involves: 1) segmenting vascular structures from medical images; 2) constructing analytic arterial and venous geometric models; 3) performing finite element mesh generation; 4) designing, and 5) applying boundary conditions; 6) running incompressible Navier-Stokes simulations of blood flow with fluid-structure interaction capabilities; and 7) post-processing and visualizing the results, including velocity, pressure and wall shear stress fields. A key aim of CRIMSON is to create a software environment that makes powerful computational haemodynamics tools accessible to a wide audience, including clinicians and students, both within our research laboratories and throughout the community. The overall philosophy is to leverage best-in-class open source standards for medical image processing, parallel flow computation, geometric solid modelling, data assimilation, and mesh generation. It is actively used by researchers in Europe, North and South America, Asia, and Australia. It has been applied to numerous clinical problems; we illustrate applications of CRIMSON to real-world problems using examples ranging from pre-operative surgical planning to medical device design optimization. We provide the first full presentation in the literature of CRIMSON, the Cardiovascular Integrated Modelling and Simulation Package. CRIMSON consists of a graphical user interface desktop computer program for creating geometric models of blood vessels from medical imaging scans, specifying parameters such as the stiffness of the artery walls, the resistance of connected vessels which are not visible on the scans, and determining the appropriate parameters for all aspects of the model. CRIMSON additionally consists of the Flowsolver, a high-performance computing package which simulates the flow of blood through the models created in the graphical user interface. Whilst several packages which can simulate blood flow exist, most target general fluid simulations, and this lack of specialisation means that blood flow simulation is harder to perform, and can require ad hoc (and potentially scientifically-limiting) workflow decisions. CRIMSON’s specialisation deals with these problems, as well as presenting a number of unique features which are unavailable elsewhere.