Hughes and Hossain make case for computational mechanics in medicine in interdisciplinary journal

Classically, computational mechanics has been applied to industries such as energy, materials, transportation, and defense. But according to ICES researchers, some of the most important advancements in computational mechanics are happening on a much more intimate scale: the human body.

Members of the U.S. National Committee on Theoretical and Applied Mechanics and collaborators, including Thomas Hughes, director of the ICES Computational Mechanics Group, and Shaolie Hossain, ICES research fellow and Texas Heart Institute research scientist and assistant professor, have published an article reviewing how computational mechanics is creating new opportunities in medicine, including new ways to treat tumor growth and heart disease.

The article was published in May in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface, a United Kingdom cross-disciplinary publication that highlights potential medical and biological applications in science and math.

“This journal truly serves as an interface between medicine and science,” Hossain said. “ The names [on the article] are very high profile on the computational side…so if physicians are looking for computational research advancements, it’s sure to grab their attention.”

The article presents three research areas where computational medicine has already made important progress, and will likely continue to do so: nano/microdevices, biomedical devices (including diagnostic systems, and organ models), and cellular mechanics.

“[Disease is a] multiscale phenomena and investigators research diverse aspects of it,” Hossain said, explaining that although disease may be perceived at an organ level, treatments usually function at the molecular and cellular scales.

An example of applied research presented in the article that incorporates all three notable research areas is Hughes and Hossain’s research on vulnerable plaques, also called VPs, a category of atherosclerosis responsible for 70 percent of lethal heart attacks.

“The detection and treatment of VPs represents an enormous unmet clinical need. Progress on this has the potential to save innumerable lives. Computational mechanics combined with high performance computing provide new and unique technologies for investigating disease, unlike anything that has been traditionally used in medical research,” Hughes said.

The high death rates attributed to VPs stem from their near clinical invisibility; conventional plaque detection techniques such as MRI and CT scanning don’t register VPs because they don’t cause significant vascular narrowing. Hughes and Hossain, however, have developed a computational toolset that can aid in making the plaques visible by way of targeted delivery of functionalized nanoparticles. Their computational models draw on patient-specific data to predict how well nanoparticles can adhere to a potential plaque, thus enabling site-specific treatments to be tested and refined.

If a VP is detected, the same techniques can be employed to send nanoparticles containing medicine directly to the VP.

The program is in the process of being applied in a clinical setting at the Texas Heart Institute, a nonprofit dedicated to fighting cardiovascular diseases through research, education and patient treatment programs where Hossain is a research scientist and assistant professor.

“Early intervention and prevention of heart attacks are where we certainly want to go and we are excited about the possibilities for computational mechanics being a vehicle to get us there safely and more rapidly,” said Dr. James T. Willerson, President of the Texas Heart Institute.

Other computationally aided models are already being used to help physicians evaluate and treat patients. For example, HeartFlow, a company founded by Charles Taylor, a former Ph.D. student of Hughes, uses CT scan data to create patient specific models of arteries, which can be used to diagnose coronary artery disease.

However, despite its success and demonstrated potential, computational mechanics in the medical field is still a new concept for scientists and physicians alike, says Hossain. A major goal of publishing the article is to spread and promote the medical potential of computational mechanics to those who may be interested in the field, but haven't yet been exposed to it.

“The potential that we have, in my opinion, hasn't been tapped to the fullest because of the gap in knowledge,” Hossain said. “I believe lack of knowledge is the rate-limiting step.”

To help integrate medicine into a field that has been historically focused in more traditional engineering fields, the article advocates incorporating questions in biology and chemistry into computational mechanics classes, as well as offering classes that can benefit both medical and computational science students.

Beyond the article, Hossain is personally helping to incorporate computational mechanics into medicine at the Texas Heart Institute. Along with technical and research aspects, she says a large part of her job at the institute is simply offering the new options and perspective that computational mechanics enables.

“A recent review paper by one of my Texas Heart colleagues included an interesting quote,” said Hossain. “She wrote, ‘serendipity may be necessary to find the proper seeding and culture protocol’ and I said, ‘no, modeling is something you can rely on to ensure optimum results."