A Preload and Afterload Sensitive Artificial Ventricle to Test Cardiovascular Prostheses

In the last decades cardiovascular diseases greatly increased worldwide, and bioengineering provided new technologies and cardiovascular prostheses to medical doctors and surgeons. Ventricular assist devices aroused notable interests. As a consequence it is important to faithfully reproduce the interaction between the prostheses and the cardiovascular system when in-vitro experiments are performed. For this reason, a new and improved kind of test benches become necessary. In this paper an artificial ventricle connected to a hydraulic circuit is described. The ventricle’s control architecture is based on the estimation of some characteristic parameters. It is showed how this control strategy leads to the mutual interaction between the artificial ventricle and the hydraulic circuit and a correct mean atrial (preload) and aortic (afterload) pressure sensitivity and hydrodynamics.Copyright c © 2005 IFAC