The Shape of the Urine Stream — From Biophysics to Diagnostics
We develop a new computational model of capillary-waves in free-jet flows, and apply this to the problem of urological diagnosis in this first ever study of the biophysics behind the characteristic shape of the urine stream as it exits the urethral meatus. The computational fluid dynamics model is u...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Public Library of Science
2012
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3473049/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23091609 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0047133 |
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author | Wheeler, Andrew P. S. Morad, Samir Buchholz, Noor Knight, Martin M. |
author_facet | Wheeler, Andrew P. S. Morad, Samir Buchholz, Noor Knight, Martin M. |
author_sort | Wheeler, Andrew P. S. |
collection | PubMed |
description | We develop a new computational model of capillary-waves in free-jet flows, and apply this to the problem of urological diagnosis in this first ever study of the biophysics behind the characteristic shape of the urine stream as it exits the urethral meatus. The computational fluid dynamics model is used to determine the shape of a liquid jet issuing from a non-axisymmetric orifice as it deforms under the action of surface tension. The computational results are verified with experimental modelling of the urine stream. We find that the shape of the stream can be used as an indicator of both the flow rate and orifice geometry. We performed volunteer trials which showed these fundamental correlations are also observed in vivo for male healthy volunteers and patients undergoing treatment for low flow rate. For healthy volunteers, self estimation of the flow shape provided an accurate estimation of peak flow rate ([Image: see text]). However for the patients, the relationship between shape and flow rate suggested poor meatal opening during voiding. The results show that self measurement of the shape of the urine stream can be a useful diagnostic tool for medical practitioners since it provides a non-invasive method of measuring urine flow rate and urethral dilation. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-3473049 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2012 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-34730492012-10-22 The Shape of the Urine Stream — From Biophysics to Diagnostics Wheeler, Andrew P. S. Morad, Samir Buchholz, Noor Knight, Martin M. PLoS One Research Article We develop a new computational model of capillary-waves in free-jet flows, and apply this to the problem of urological diagnosis in this first ever study of the biophysics behind the characteristic shape of the urine stream as it exits the urethral meatus. The computational fluid dynamics model is used to determine the shape of a liquid jet issuing from a non-axisymmetric orifice as it deforms under the action of surface tension. The computational results are verified with experimental modelling of the urine stream. We find that the shape of the stream can be used as an indicator of both the flow rate and orifice geometry. We performed volunteer trials which showed these fundamental correlations are also observed in vivo for male healthy volunteers and patients undergoing treatment for low flow rate. For healthy volunteers, self estimation of the flow shape provided an accurate estimation of peak flow rate ([Image: see text]). However for the patients, the relationship between shape and flow rate suggested poor meatal opening during voiding. The results show that self measurement of the shape of the urine stream can be a useful diagnostic tool for medical practitioners since it provides a non-invasive method of measuring urine flow rate and urethral dilation. Public Library of Science 2012-10-16 /pmc/articles/PMC3473049/ /pubmed/23091609 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0047133 Text en © 2012 Wheeler et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Wheeler, Andrew P. S. Morad, Samir Buchholz, Noor Knight, Martin M. The Shape of the Urine Stream — From Biophysics to Diagnostics |
title | The Shape of the Urine Stream — From Biophysics to Diagnostics |
title_full | The Shape of the Urine Stream — From Biophysics to Diagnostics |
title_fullStr | The Shape of the Urine Stream — From Biophysics to Diagnostics |
title_full_unstemmed | The Shape of the Urine Stream — From Biophysics to Diagnostics |
title_short | The Shape of the Urine Stream — From Biophysics to Diagnostics |
title_sort | shape of the urine stream — from biophysics to diagnostics |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3473049/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23091609 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0047133 |
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