Grid-based virtual medical support system
A grid-based problem-solving environment (PSE) prototype was developed for virtual vascular surgery. A set of hardware and software resources available via the CrossGrid infrastructure, were developed. They were used to build a specific framework to support vascular surgeons and interventional radiologists with pre-operative decision making. The team achieved secure Grid access, node discovery and registration, Grid data transfer, application initialisation, medical data segmentation, segmented data visualisation, and computational mesh creation. They also achieved secure job submission, distributed blood flow and bypass creation. The medical application for vascular reconstruction was incorporate into the Grid. A medical image repository in Leiden was used as a source of data for experiments. Resources from the Grid were used to simulate the patient's blood flow. An efficient mesoscopic computational haemodynamics solver for blood-flow simulations was based on parallel cellular automata. Pulsatile Newtonian flow was simulated in a straight rigid 3D tube. The simulation volume was divided into a number of sub-volumes in order to allow for parallel execution, and each sub-volume was processed concurrently. A unique desktop Virtual Reality system was developed to ensure user-friendliness. This served as the interaction-visualisation front end for the person operating the system over the Grid. End-users were able to interact with the system via a multi-modal interface. This combined natural input modes that can be operated by voice, hand gestures and manipulation of 3D objects. The system has been named the Virtual Operating Theatre. The operator takes the part of a vascular surgeon, treating vascular disease in a simulated virtual patient.
