Modeling and experimental validation of 1,064 nm laser interstitial thermal therapy on brain tissue.

Introduction: Laser interstitial thermal therapy (LITT) at 1064 nm is widely used to treat epilepsy and brain tumors; however, no numerical model exists that can predict the ablation region with careful in vivo validation.

Methods: In this study, we proposed a model with a system of finite element methods simulating heat transfer inside the brain tissue, radiative transfer from the applicator into the brain tissue, and a model for tissue damage.

Results: To speed up the computation for practical applications, we also validated P1-approximation as an efficient and fast method for calculating radiative transfer by comparing it with Monte Carlo simulation.