Interstitial Pressure And Fluid Motion In Tumor Cords

Pages: 445 - 460, Volume 2, Issue 3, August 2005

doi:10.3934/mbe.2005.2.445       Abstract        Full Text (405.0K)       Related Articles

Alessandro Bertuzzi - Istituto di Analisi dei Sistemi ed Informatica ''A. Ruberti", CNR, Viale Manzoni 30, 00185 Roma, Italy (email)
Antonio Fasano - Dipartimento di Matematica "U. Dini", Università di Firenze, Viale Morgagni 67/A, 50134 Firenze, Italy (email)
Alberto Gandolfi - Istituto di Analisi dei Sistemi ed Informatica ''A. Ruberti", CNR, Viale Manzoni 30, 00185 Roma, Italy (email)
Carmela Sinisgalli - Istituto di Analisi dei Sistemi ed Informatica ''A. Ruberti", CNR, Viale Manzoni 30, 00185 Roma, Italy (email)

Abstract: This work illustrates the behavior of the interstitial pressure and of the interstitial fluid motion in tumor cords (cylindrical arrangements of tumor cells growing around blood vessels of the tumor) by means of numerical simulations on the basis of a mathematical model previously developed. The model describes the steady state of a tumor cord surrounded by necrosis and its time evolution following cell killing. The most relevant aspects of the dynamics of extracellular fluid are by computing the longitudinal average of the radial fluid velocity and of the pressure field. In the present paper, the necrotic region is treated as a mixture of degrading dead cells and fluid.

Keywords:  tumor growth, interstitial pressure, extracellular fluid, cancer treat- ment, PDE modeling, free boundary problems
Mathematics Subject Classification:  35R35, 92C37, 92C50.

Received: January 2005;      Accepted: June 2005;      Published: August 2005.