This paper presents a three dimensional numerical study to investigate the effects of blood flow in thermally significant blood vessels on the iceball evolution during cryosurgery of target tissue using multiple cryoprobes. Discretization of the Pennes' bioheat equation, which should include convection term for blood vessel, was obtained using an alternate direction implicit finite difference (ADI-FD) scheme combined with an adaptive grid approach. The iceball front is then characterized by temperature profile. A comprehensive analysis of the influence of blood velocity, blood vessel size and the number of multiple cryoprobe on iceball evolution within target tissue undergoing cryosurgery is presented in detail. This work may enhance current understanding of the factors for determining the effects of cryosurgery.
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