Meshing from CT scans

[charlie-garcia]

Hi,

I want mesh some complex biological structures fom CT scan files. Is there any software advice I can use?

One idea is to convert the CT scans to STL files (triangular surface mesh), mesh the volume with tetrahedra and later convert the tetrahedral elements into hexas. So far I've tested with meshlab to clean the STL coming from the DICOM files and then mesh with gmsh. However, there are many variables to change to make gmsh work and I'm not there yet. In small examples I tested, sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. I'm not very proficient with Cubit but open to suggestions. Maybe that's the way.

Another idea is to create a geometry model of the CT scan and then mesh the geometry directly of by parts and merge it. I looked for and it seems that there are some software that might do the job, such as spaceclaim or ANSYS. I would appreciate any tips or feedback you may have before purchasing any software.

Thank you,

Carlos