On an acoustics–thermal–fluid coupling model for the prediction of temperature elevation in liver tumor

The present study is aimed at predicting liver tumor temperature during a high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) thermal ablation using the proposed acoustics–thermal–fluid coupling model. The linear Westervelt equation is adopted for modeling the incident finite-amplitude wave propagation. The nonlinear hemodynamic equations are also taken into account in the simulation domain that contains a hepatic tissue domain, where homogenization dominates perfusion, and a vascular domain, where blood convective cooling may be essential in determining the success of HIFU. Energy equation for thermal conduction involves two heat sinks to account for tissue perfusion and forced convection-induced cooling. The effect of acoustic streaming is also included in the development of the current HIFU simulation study. Convective cooling in large blood vessel and acoustic streaming were shown to change the temperature near blood vessel. It was shown that acoustic streaming effect can affect the blood flow distribution in hepatic arterial branches and leads to the mass flux redistribution.