Discovery of an explicit closure dispersion model for contrast-agent transport in arteries

Abstract

At high Peclet number, the classical Taylor-Aris dispersion model becomes inadequate for early-time contrast-agent transport in arteries, while an explicit closure model and a clear physical interpretation of this regime remain lacking. In this study, we develop a novel explicit-closure one-dimensional (1-D) effective dispersion model for this regime, with its functional structures identified through symbolic regression. Analysis of the resulting model reveals that, in the high-Peclet-number regime, axial transport is redistributed between the effective convection flux and the dispersive flux, resulting in a reduction of the effective convective transport velocity in the dispersion model. This redistribution gives rise to a transition from the classical quadratic scaling to a linear scaling of the effective diffusivity with radial Peclet number. Numerical validation demonstrates close agreement with the convection-diffusion model over the investigated high-Peclet-number conditions, while the classical Taylor-Aris model exhibits substantial deviations. Application of the proposed model to averaged flow velocity inversion further demonstrates improved velocity estimation, particularly in the high-Peclet-number regime. These results highlight the importance of accounting for non-classical dispersion for reliable contrast-agent-based arterial blood flow velocimetry and provide new insight into high-Peclet-number mass transport.