STEPHEN JOHN PAYNE2024-08-262024-08-2620249783031585180978303158519721993041https://www.scopus.com/record/display.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85200496045&origin=resultslisthttps://scholars.lib.ntu.edu.tw/handle/123456789/720378The cerebral microcirculation is a highly complex interconnected network of vessels that cover a wide range of length scales and respond over a wide range of time scales. It plays a critical role in the delivery of nutrients to tissue and the removal of metabolic waste products. Impairments to the cerebral microcirculation are implicated in many cerebrovascular and neurodegenerative diseases. Despite this, until around 15 years ago, little quantitative information was known about its anatomy and geometry in humans; the advent of new data since then has led to a substantial body of work to model blood flow and oxygen transport within the microcirculation and surrounding tissue. Until around 10 years ago, it was also thought to be a largely passive bed with control of cerebral blood flow (CBF) occurring upstream (in the arteriolar bed) and with limited implications in the impairment of cerebral blood flow, either in healthy or in diseased states. However, it is now known that there is significant control of CBF at this length scale through the action of pericytes. Given the difficulties involved in imaging this vascular bed in humans, models of the cerebral microcirculation have an important role to play in gaining a better understanding of CBF and its behaviour in different conditions. In this chapter, the development and application of models of the cerebral microcirculation are thus described, together with potential avenues for future exploration.falseCerebral blood flowCerebral haemodynamicsMicrocirculationbook part10.1007/978-3-031-58519-7_12-s2.0-85200496045