A novel apparatus to measure the biomechanical properties of blood vessels

Purpose The study of vascular mechanics is important. The purpose of this paper is to present an apparatus to measure the biomechanical properties of blood vessels, which can be used for tensile test and fatigue test. Design/methodology/approach This equipment consists of a mechanical test platform, a hardware circuit based on FPGA and control software. The torque generated by stepper motor is converted to axial force by ball screw, and the vascular specimen is stretched axially. The tension is measured by a load cell, and the displacement is recorded by a grating displacement sensor. Findings According to the results of calibration experiment and stability experiment, the linearity error of the system is 0.251, the hysteresis error is 0.047, the repeatability error is 0.185, the comprehensive error is 0.315 and the standard deviation of the output is less than 0.01 N. A test of animal vascular mechanical properties was carried out, and the results are consistent with the theory. Originality/value This apparatus is designed to measure biomechanical properties of blood vessels, and the results of experiments indicate that it is stable and reliable. This work is valuable for studying vascular disease and testing artificial blood vessels.