Numerical Study of Human Pulmonary Cilia in the Periciliary Liquid Layer

Abstract

A three-dimensional numerical mdoel is developed to study the human pulmonary cilia motion in the periciliary liquid (PCL) layer. The governing equations are solved using the immersed boundary method coupled with the pressure increment projection method. The cilia beating pattern is prescribed for the simulations. The fluid-cilia interaction forces are computed by the direct forcing method. The effect of the phase difference between cilia on the PCL motion is investigated by employing different phasing. The present numerical results exhibit that the maximul PCL velocity in the stream-wise direction occurs if cilia have phase differences in both the flow and orthogonal directions.