Numerical Simulation of Flow Field, Heat and Moisture Transfer in the Human Nasal Cavity Pre and Post Virtual Turbinectomy

Turbinates play an important role in conditioning of inhaled air and affect the air flow passing the nasal cavity. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of removing inferior turbinate on flow field, heat and moisture transfer from mucosa into the inhaled-air in a human nasal cavity and comparison of them before and after the surgery. Turbinectomy was performed virtually on the computational model under the specialist’s supervision. In this study the airflow assumed to be laminar and unsteady. The nasal wall assumed to be rigid and no slip boundary condition was set. Moreover, the mucous layer assumed to be within fixed thickness in all over nasal cavity surface. The temperature and humidity distribution over the surface of mucusa are found by numerical computation. The results depict that conditioning of the nasal airway deteriorates by removing the inferior turbinate. For a specific air flow rate, both the heat and moisture flux averages decrease after surgery.