Hyperbolic reformulation of a 1D viscoelastic blood flow model and ADER finite volume schemes

The applicability of ADER finite volume methods to solve hyperbolic balance laws with stiff source terms in the context of well-balanced and non-conservative schemes is extended to solve a one-dimensional blood flow model for viscoelastic vessels, reformulated as a hyperbolic system, via a relaxation time. A criterion for selecting relaxation times is found and an empirical convergence rate assessment is carried out to support this result. The proposed methodology is validated by applying it to a network of viscoelastic vessels for which experimental and numerical results are available. The agreement between the results obtained in the present paper and those available in the literature is satisfactory. Key features of the present formulation and numerical methodologies, such as accuracy, efficiency and robustness, are fully discussed in the paper.