Using sophisticated computer modelling developed to explore the flow of liquid metal through rocks, the scientists were able to show doctors where the patient’s blood was gathering in a pool in their heart due to a blood clot. Doctors were then able to confirm the clot and treat the patient, who has not been named for confidentiality reasons.
The researchers now hope to conduct more detailed clinical studies on the technique to see if it could be used routinely as a way of identifying dangerous blood clots in heart patients. Nick Petford, a geologist and pro vice-chancellor at Bournemouth University, who led the research, said: “We were examining how liquid metal accumulates in the core of a planet like the Earth over just a few million years, which is quite fast in geological terms.
“The metal flows through cracks and fissures that open up in the rock as the planet is deformed by impacts from outer space during its early period. When we started talking to clinicians, we found that actually the vascular system was just like these cracks we were studying and we were able to look at blood flow in the same way we looked at the flow of metal.”
Petford’s technology uses a computer to scan images of cracks in arteries in the heart to produce an accurate simulation of how liquid will flow through them. Working with Roger Patel, a consultant radiologist at the Royal Bournemouth Hospital, the experts used MRI scans of a patients heart to analyse the blood flow. Doctors now hope the technology can be developed so it can be used routinely to analyse scans from heart patients.
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