American Journal of BioScience

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Experimental Investigation on the Ice Formation and Growth in Ex Vivo Bovine Liver

Received: 20 September 2018    Accepted: 11 October 2018    Published: 15 November 2018
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Abstract

The paper presents a set of experiments to characterize the ice front propagation in ex vivo bovine liver samples. Based on previous successful experiments using water and agar-gel as tested materials, the methodology infers the ice evolution in the sample from temperature measures obtained at the cooling device only, with a technique known as mirror image. No analytical or numerical solutions are proposed for the phase change propagation inside the tested material, such as for instance the Stefan approach as a classical free boundary problem for a parabolic partial differential equation. Thermal events inside the tested material, such as the heat flux released during the phase transition, have been deduced by the measured temperatures and the numerical solution of the thermal field inside the cooling device, conceived to mimic some thermal features of an actual cryogenic probe. The application domain for these experiments is in the cryoablative therapy, and the aim is to help providing an increased knowledge on the thermal effects to better deduce the effectiveness of the treatment and reduce recurrences, while at the same time avoid damages in the proximal anatomical structures. Results show that it is possible to detect the triggering of ice formation at the interface between the liver samples and the cooling device and predict the ice front propagation according to a law linear on the heat subtracted per unit of area. In a few tens of seconds, the maximum ice penetration distance is about 2 mm inside the liver tissue, with a penetration rate that goes from 0.2 mm/s to 0.02 mm/s. Moreover, adopting a special sample configured as an agar-gel coating superimposed to an ex vivo liver layer, the arrival time of the ice penetrating the liver and the temperature at the interface between these materials were detected, in order to estimate the part of the heat flux useful to the ice formation with respect to that spent for cooling the surrounding medium. Based on this preliminary result, to improve the cryoablation effectiveness it could be useful to increase the heat flux per unit of surface at the beginning, instead of the ablation duration.

DOI 10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11
Published in American Journal of BioScience (Volume 6, Issue 3, May 2018)
Page(s) 35-44
Creative Commons

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.

Copyright

Copyright © The Author(s), 2024. Published by Science Publishing Group

Keywords

Cryoablation, Ex Vivo Liver, Mirror Image Technique, Ice formation in Tissue, Cryosurgery

References
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[2] Choi, J., & Bischof, J. C. (2011). Cooling rate dependent biophysical and viability response shift with attachment state in human dermal fibroblast cells. Cryobiology, 63, 285 – 291.
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[10] Weng, L., Tessier, S. N., Swei, A., Stott, S. L., & Toner, M. (2017). Controlled ice nucleation using freeze-dried pseudomonas syringae encapsulated in alginate beads. Cryobiology, 75, 1 – 6.
[11] Gaita, F., Riccardi, R., Caponi, D., Shah, D., Garberoglio, L., Vivalda, L., Dulio, A., Chiecchio, A., Manasse, E., & Gallotti, R. (2005). Linear cryoablation of the left atrium versus pulmonary vein cryoisolation in patients with permanent atrial fibrillation and valvular heart disease. Circulation, 111, 136–142.
[12] Gaita, F., Caponi, D., Scaglione, M., Montefusco, A., Corleto, A., Di Monte, F., Coin, D., Di Donna, P., & Giustetto, C. (2008). Long-term clinical results of 2 different ablation strategies in patients with paroxysmal and persistent atrial fibrillation. Circulation: Arrhythmia and Electrophysiology, 1, 269–275.
[13] Giaretto, V., & Passerone, C. (2017). Mirror image technique for the thermal analysis in cryoablation: Experimental setup and validation. Cryobiology, 79, 56 – 64.
[14] Fürnkranz, A., Köster, I., Chun, K. J., Metzner, A., Mathew, S., Konstantinidou, M., Ouyang, F., & Kuck, K. H. (2011). Cryoballoon temperature predicts acute pulmonary vein isolation. Heart Rhythm, 8, 821 – 825.
[15] Gonzalez, R. C., & Woods, R. E. (2006). Digital Image Processing (3rd Edition). Upper Saddle River, NJ, USA: Prentice-Hall, Inc.
[16] Kim, C., O’Rourke, A. P., Will, J. A., Mahvi, D. M., & Webster, J. G. (2008). Finite-element analysis of hepatic cryoablation around a large blood vessel. IEEE Transactions on Biomedical Engineering, 55, 2087–2093.
[17] Chan, J. Y., & Ooi, E. H. (2016). Sensitivity of thermophysiological models of cryoablation to the thermal and biophysical properties of tissues. Cryobiology, 73, 304 – 315.
[18] Matta, M., Anselmino, M., Ferraris, F., Scaglione, M., Gaita, F. (2018). Cryoballoon vs. radiofrequency contact force ablation for paroxysmal atrial fibrillation: a propensity score analysis. J Cardiovasc Med, 19(4), 141 – 147.
[19] Matta, M., Anselmino, M., Scaglione, M., Vitolo, M., Ferraris, F., Di Donna, P., Caponi, D., Castagno, D., Gaita, F. (2017). Cooling dynamics: a new predictor of long-term efficacy of atrioventricular nodal reentrant tachycardia cryoablation. J Interv Card Electrophysio, 48(3), 333 – 341.
[20] Ting-Yung, C., Li-Wei, L., Abigail, L., Yenn-Jiang, L., Shih-Lin, C., Yu-Feng, H., Fa-Po, C., Tze-Fan, C., Nan, L., Ta-Chuan, T., Chin-Yu, L. (2018). The importance of Extra-Pulmonary Vein Triggers and Atypical Atrial Flutter in Atrial Fibrillation Recurrence After Cryoablation: Insights from Repeat Ablation Procedures. J Cardiovasc Electrophysiol. doi: 10.1111/jce. 13741.
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[22] Marrouche, N. F., Brachmann, J., Andresen, D., Siebels, J., Boersma, L., Jordaens, L., Merkely, B., Pokushalov, E., Sanders, P., Proff, J., Schunkert, H., Christ, H., Vogt, J., Bänsch, D. (2018). CASTLE-AF Investigators. Catheter Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation with Heart Failure. N Engl J Med., 378(5), 417 – 427.
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Author Information
  • Department of Energy, Politecnico di Torino, Torino, Italy

  • Department of Electronics and Telecommunications, Politecnico di Torino, Torino, Italy

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  • APA Style

    Valter Giaretto, Claudio Passerone. (2018). Experimental Investigation on the Ice Formation and Growth in Ex Vivo Bovine Liver. American Journal of BioScience, 6(3), 35-44. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11

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    ACS Style

    Valter Giaretto; Claudio Passerone. Experimental Investigation on the Ice Formation and Growth in Ex Vivo Bovine Liver. Am. J. BioScience 2018, 6(3), 35-44. doi: 10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11

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    AMA Style

    Valter Giaretto, Claudio Passerone. Experimental Investigation on the Ice Formation and Growth in Ex Vivo Bovine Liver. Am J BioScience. 2018;6(3):35-44. doi: 10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11

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  • @article{10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11,
      author = {Valter Giaretto and Claudio Passerone},
      title = {Experimental Investigation on the Ice Formation and Growth in Ex Vivo Bovine Liver},
      journal = {American Journal of BioScience},
      volume = {6},
      number = {3},
      pages = {35-44},
      doi = {10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11},
      url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11},
      eprint = {https://download.sciencepg.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ajbio.20180603.11},
      abstract = {The paper presents a set of experiments to characterize the ice front propagation in ex vivo bovine liver samples. Based on previous successful experiments using water and agar-gel as tested materials, the methodology infers the ice evolution in the sample from temperature measures obtained at the cooling device only, with a technique known as mirror image. No analytical or numerical solutions are proposed for the phase change propagation inside the tested material, such as for instance the Stefan approach as a classical free boundary problem for a parabolic partial differential equation. Thermal events inside the tested material, such as the heat flux released during the phase transition, have been deduced by the measured temperatures and the numerical solution of the thermal field inside the cooling device, conceived to mimic some thermal features of an actual cryogenic probe. The application domain for these experiments is in the cryoablative therapy, and the aim is to help providing an increased knowledge on the thermal effects to better deduce the effectiveness of the treatment and reduce recurrences, while at the same time avoid damages in the proximal anatomical structures. Results show that it is possible to detect the triggering of ice formation at the interface between the liver samples and the cooling device and predict the ice front propagation according to a law linear on the heat subtracted per unit of area. In a few tens of seconds, the maximum ice penetration distance is about 2 mm inside the liver tissue, with a penetration rate that goes from 0.2 mm/s to 0.02 mm/s. Moreover, adopting a special sample configured as an agar-gel coating superimposed to an ex vivo liver layer, the arrival time of the ice penetrating the liver and the temperature at the interface between these materials were detected, in order to estimate the part of the heat flux useful to the ice formation with respect to that spent for cooling the surrounding medium. Based on this preliminary result, to improve the cryoablation effectiveness it could be useful to increase the heat flux per unit of surface at the beginning, instead of the ablation duration.},
     year = {2018}
    }
    

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  • TY  - JOUR
    T1  - Experimental Investigation on the Ice Formation and Growth in Ex Vivo Bovine Liver
    AU  - Valter Giaretto
    AU  - Claudio Passerone
    Y1  - 2018/11/15
    PY  - 2018
    N1  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11
    DO  - 10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11
    T2  - American Journal of BioScience
    JF  - American Journal of BioScience
    JO  - American Journal of BioScience
    SP  - 35
    EP  - 44
    PB  - Science Publishing Group
    SN  - 2330-0167
    UR  - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ajbio.20180603.11
    AB  - The paper presents a set of experiments to characterize the ice front propagation in ex vivo bovine liver samples. Based on previous successful experiments using water and agar-gel as tested materials, the methodology infers the ice evolution in the sample from temperature measures obtained at the cooling device only, with a technique known as mirror image. No analytical or numerical solutions are proposed for the phase change propagation inside the tested material, such as for instance the Stefan approach as a classical free boundary problem for a parabolic partial differential equation. Thermal events inside the tested material, such as the heat flux released during the phase transition, have been deduced by the measured temperatures and the numerical solution of the thermal field inside the cooling device, conceived to mimic some thermal features of an actual cryogenic probe. The application domain for these experiments is in the cryoablative therapy, and the aim is to help providing an increased knowledge on the thermal effects to better deduce the effectiveness of the treatment and reduce recurrences, while at the same time avoid damages in the proximal anatomical structures. Results show that it is possible to detect the triggering of ice formation at the interface between the liver samples and the cooling device and predict the ice front propagation according to a law linear on the heat subtracted per unit of area. In a few tens of seconds, the maximum ice penetration distance is about 2 mm inside the liver tissue, with a penetration rate that goes from 0.2 mm/s to 0.02 mm/s. Moreover, adopting a special sample configured as an agar-gel coating superimposed to an ex vivo liver layer, the arrival time of the ice penetrating the liver and the temperature at the interface between these materials were detected, in order to estimate the part of the heat flux useful to the ice formation with respect to that spent for cooling the surrounding medium. Based on this preliminary result, to improve the cryoablation effectiveness it could be useful to increase the heat flux per unit of surface at the beginning, instead of the ablation duration.
    VL  - 6
    IS  - 3
    ER  - 

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