Real-time feedback control of lifetec group's cardiac biosimulator based on averaged hemodynamics

LifeTec Group has developed a Cardiac Biosimulator where a dead porcine heart is used to mimic a beating heart in a simulated environment. This is useful for assessment of medical devices or as a training platform for medical professionals. The research presented aims at extending this simulator by designing feedback controllers for the time-averaged relevant pressures and flow, which reduces the startup time and potentially increases stability of the simulator. To achieve this, both the continuous and time-averaged models of the simulator are presented together with their state-space representations. The proposed controller consists of three independent PI controllers, which are presented along with simulation and measurement results and show promising system performance. Lastly, the controller implementation was tested on the Biosimulator with a pathological heart (Mitral prolapse), which showed no significant decrease in performance compared to the physiological heart.