Development of a software based on a mathematical model of the renal system for computer physiology practices for biomedical studies

Abstract

A complete understanding of human organs and systems cannot be achieved only by theoretical classes. Practical lessons are also part of the curriculum of courses like Molecular Biology or Physiology. The great majority of vital processes and structures studied in these courses are not easy to reach and therefore, there is a need to develop realistic simulators based on mathematical models to work with. One of these unreachable systems is the Renal System. The purpose of the present study is to program and develop a software intended to be used as a support tool in

the study of the Renal System functioning of Medicine, Human Biology and Biomed- ical Engineering students. The software is developed in Python programming lan- guage and it includes a user-friendly interface created by Qt, a cross-platform soft- ware.

The Renal System regulates extracellular liquid volume, blood pressure or osmo- larity, among others. The software reproduces one of the main renal processes;

glomerular filtration. This procedure is primarily performed by the nephrons, the

functional units of the kidneys. Glomerular filtration is conditioned by many differ- ent factors, like for example blood pressure or arterioles’ radius located around the

nephrons.

The program simulates different scenarios and shows how the factors mentioned af- fect important parameters such as the Single-Nephron Glomerular Filtration Rate

(SNGFR), which refers to the volume of plasma filtered per unit of time in each nephron, the glomerular pressure or the urine volume, and at the same time, how these changes influence the renal function.