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Bubble dynamics in a viscoelastic medium with nonlinear elasticity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2015

R. Gaudron*
Affiliation:
Mechanical Engineering Department, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
M. T. Warnez
Affiliation:
Mechanical Engineering Department, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
E. Johnsen*
Affiliation:
Mechanical Engineering Department, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
*
†Email addresses for correspondence: renaud.gaudron@centraliens.net, ejohnsen@umich.edu
†Email addresses for correspondence: renaud.gaudron@centraliens.net, ejohnsen@umich.edu
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Abstract

In a variety of recently developed medical procedures, bubbles are formed directly in soft tissue and may cause damage. While cavitation in Newtonian liquids has received significant attention, bubble dynamics in tissue, a viscoelastic medium, remains poorly understood. To model tissue, most previous studies have focused on Maxwell-based viscoelastic fluids. However, soft tissue generally possesses an original configuration to which it relaxes after deformation. Thus, a Kelvin–Voigt-based viscoelastic model is expected to be a more appropriate representation. Furthermore, large oscillations may occur, thus violating the infinitesimal strain assumption and requiring a nonlinear/finite-strain elasticity description. In this article, we develop a theoretical framework to simulate spherical bubble dynamics in a viscoelastic medium with nonlinear elasticity. Following modern continuum mechanics formalism, we derive the form of the elastic forces acting on a bubble for common strain-energy functions (e.g. neo-Hookean, Mooney–Rivlin) and incorporate them into Rayleigh–Plesset-like equations. The main effects of nonlinear elasticity are to reduce the violence of the collapse and rebound for large departures from the equilibrium radius, and increase the oscillation frequency. The present approach can readily be extended to other strain-energy functions and used to compute the stress/deformation fields in the surrounding medium.

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© 2015 Cambridge University Press 
Figure 0

Figure 1. Problem setting using typical continuum mechanics convention.

Figure 1

Figure 2. Schematic of the present Kelvin–Voigt viscoelastic model consisting of a spring ${\it\eta}$ and a dashpot ${\it\mu}$ in parallel.

Figure 2

Figure 3. Absolute value of the dimensionless elastic force acting on the bubble (a, log–log) with a zoomed in view near $R/R_{o}=1$ (b, linear–linear). For $R/R_{o}<1$, the force is negative.

Figure 3

Table 1. Summary of the elastic terms in the Rayleigh–Plesset/Keller–Miksis equations for the one-parameter constitutive models.

Figure 4

Figure 4. Frequency response contour map: dimensionless amplitude of a bubble in a neo-Hookean medium. The driving-pressure amplitude is $0.8$ bar.

Figure 5

Figure 5. Frequency response curves for ${\it\eta}=100~\text{kPa}$ and a pressure–wave amplitude of 0.8 bar.

Figure 6

Figure 6. Peak frequency ${\it\omega}_{p}$ as a function of $R_{eq}$.

Figure 7

Figure 7. History of the bubble radius following a step increase in pressure for different constitutive models (${\rm\Delta}p=100$ bar). Time is non-dimensionalized by the Rayleigh collapse time $t_{RC}$.

Figure 8

Figure 8. Detailed view of the history of the bubble radius (a) and velocity (b) following a step increase in pressure at the first collapse. Time is non-dimensionalized by the Rayleigh collapse time $t_{RC}$.

Figure 9

Figure 9. History of the bubble radius for the bubble initially out of equilibrium for different constitutive models ($R_{o}/R_{eq}^{N}=2$ corresponds to ${\rm\Delta}p=-0.83$ bar). Time is non-dimensionalized by the Rayleigh collapse time $t_{RC}$.

Figure 10

Figure 10. History of the bubble radius for the bubble initially out of equilibrium for different constitutive models ($R_{o}/R_{eq}^{N}=0.5$ corresponds to ${\rm\Delta}p=7.24$ bar). Time is non-dimensionalized by the Rayleigh collapse time $t_{RC}$.

Figure 11

Figure 11. History of the bubble radius under harmonic forcing with $f=100$, 282, 425, 1000 and 3000 kHz (a–e) and ${\it\eta}=100~\text{kPa}$.