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Pregnant ladies endure all types of medical checks. That is to watch the well being of each the mom and baby and to detect potential abnormalities as early as attainable.
Though the ultrasound technician checks the place of the placenta and umbilical cords through the 20-week ultrasound, little additional consideration is paid to it past that.
And that may be a disgrace, in accordance with Pascalle Wijntjes. She spent the previous 4 years working throughout the Cardiovascular Biomechanics analysis group, mapping the placenta and investigating the way it may function an early indicator of frequent being pregnant issues.
On Tuesday July 1, Wijntjes defended her dissertation on the Division of Biomedical Engineering.
Bloody container
She has personally waited exterior the supply room a number of occasions.
“After the baby is born, the placenta detaches from the uterine wall and is expelled. Normally, the placenta ends up with the hospital waste, but fortunately, we were able to find many women willing to donate their placentas for scientific research. We’d receive a bloody container and get to work on it as quickly as possible.”
Wijntjes praises her college students, who she normally assigned this job to. “With my mathematical background, I’m not much of a hands-on person. I’d rather sit behind my laptop than have my hands inside a placenta,” she says.
Over the course of her doctoral interval, she turned more and more impressed by the placenta; a really particular collaboration between mom and baby.
“I wanted to model the placenta to predict risks of complications such as preeclampsia. But I also realized that there is still a lot we don’t know about the placenta, both in terms of its anatomy and function. There was no solid foundation. And that makes any model far less reliable.”
The tiniest capillaries
Wijntjes examined dozens of placentas utilizing superior imaging strategies corresponding to contrast-enhanced ultrasound (CEUS) and ultrasound localization microscopy (ULM) to achieve extra perception into the placenta’s vascular system—each on the mom’s aspect and the fetus’s aspect.
“We do this by injecting microscopic bubbles into a large blood vessel. Their small size allows them to pass into even the tiniest capillaries. This enables us to study important details such as the angles between certain vessels and the ratio of vessel diameter between mother and child.”
All this data was used as enter to create a mathematical mannequin of the placenta. Wijntjes opens her dissertation and exhibits a picture that resembles a branching tree. It virtually appears like mathematical artwork. “We’re one of the first groups worldwide to study the placenta this way.”
Hybrid mannequin
Along with simulating a wholesome placenta, Wijntjes has taken the primary steps towards replicating abnormalities within the placenta. For instance, she will be able to modify the vascular system in such a means that it mimics the consequences of preeclampsia. How does a narrowing of the blood vessels have an effect on blood movement within the umbilical twine, as an illustration?
“Preeclampsia is complex. We started with the basis, and step by step we want to start expanding this model to include other aspects.”
Nonetheless, Wijntjes emphasizes that the last word aim is to develop a hybrid mannequin.
“That way, we can combine clinical data and physiological insights with a mathematical model. This will make the model increasingly realistic and reliable, allowing us to better assess whether a woman is at increased risk of complications.”
She additionally mapped the expansion of the placenta throughout being pregnant, primarily based on an intensive literature evaluate. She skilled that progress firsthand when she was pregnant together with her daughter midway by means of her Ph.D. “It was very strange to suddenly see my research come to life like that.”
She chuckles. “During the ultrasound check-ups, I tried my hardest to switch off my researcher’s perspective. And everyone wants to know whether I used my own placenta for my research as well. It was very special to see it after the birth, but I did choose to keep my work and private life separate.”
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A mathematical perspective presents perception into the placenta’s position and functioning (2025, July 4)
retrieved 7 July 2025
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