From mechanistic to data-driven models for surgical planning, guidance and simulation

Biomechanical and biophysical models are key tools in many applications of surgical planning and optimisation, surgical guidance, and interactive simulation for training and rehearsal. The most robust and accurate models usually are those based on the relevant equations of continuum mechanics (solid, fluid, thermal, etc.), and which are generally solved with numerical methods such as FEM. Given high quality patient-specific inputs, these can enable accurate prediction of, e.g., deformations of soft tissues, flow patterns in blood vessels, energy delivery profiles around ablation devices, etc.