Modeling Energy Transport in Porcine Skin

Abstract

The ability to measure the burn depth in human skin is of great importance in identifying and successfully treating burn injuries. A non-invasive method for measuring this depth is described where a jet of cold air is impinged on the skin and the thermal and physiological response of the skin is observed. A computational model is developed to characterize the temperature response of the dead or burnt skin. This is validated using an experiment involving a jet impinging on a pig skin sample, with temperature measurements made by a non-invasive infrared thermocouple. This data can be used to create and compare a similar model with the inclusion of the physiological response that is present when the test is administered on live or partially burnt skin. Then a correlation may be developed that will predict the burn depth in the affected tissue.