An automated method using image registration successfully mapped atrial fiber orientations in 10 human atria, producing electrophysiological activation patterns analogous to atlas atria.
An automated image registration method successfully maps atrial fiber orientations to patient-specific geometries, enabling detailed computational modeling of cardiac electromechanics.
Knowledge of appropriate local fiber architecture is necessary to simulate patient-specific electromechanics in the human heart. However, it is not yet possible to reliably measure in vivo fiber directions especially in human atria. Thus, we present a method that defines the fiber architecture in arbitrarily shaped atria using image registration and reorientation methods based on atlas atria with fibers predefined from detailed histological observations. Thereby, it is possible to generate detailed fiber families in every new patient-specific geometry in an automated, time-efficient process. We demonstrate the good performance of the image registration and fiber definition on 10 differently shaped human atria. Additionally, we show that characteristics of the electrophysiological activation pattern that appear in the atlas atria also appear in the patients' atria. We arrive to analogous conclusions for coupled electro-mechano-hemodynamical computations.
Hoermann et al. (2019) studied Cardiac electromechanics modeling (n=10). Automated mapping of atrial fiber orientations using image registration was evaluated on Performance of image registration and fiber definition, and characteristics of electrophysiological activation pattern. An automated method using image registration successfully mapped atrial fiber orientations in 10 human atria, producing electrophysiological activation patterns analogous to atlas atria.