Abstract
Bileaflet heart valves show the best fluid dynamic behaviour among mechanical valves and, as a consequence, give the best clinical results. A new bileaflet heart valve has been designed whose main characteristics are the kind of leaflet movement, low profile, fluid dynamics and material.
Two flat leaflets move freely inside a very low profile housing ring. The movement is described by the rolling without sliding of the leaflet surface around a cylindrical surface on the inner wall of the housing. The opening angle is 85°. Both the leaflets and the housing are machined from a solid piece of titanium and then covered with carbon by ion beam techniques. The design phase and the first fluid dynamic evaluation were done by numerical methods.
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