If you’ve watched any modern action movies, you’ve probably got a pretty good mental picture of what happens when a person haemorrhages blood. But this, my friends, is the first scientific visualisation of the splatterfest. Squeamish viewers, look away.
Created by Jeff Eldredge and colleagues at the University of California, Los Angeles, the video below presents a series of fluid dynamics-based simulations of a human leg getting hit by shrapnel. The goal here is to create a training tool that combat medics can use to learn exactly what sort of bloody gushy mess (technical term) a specific injury will result in.
I consider myself pretty desensitised to cinematic gore, but there’s something deeply disturbing about the no-frills clinical nature of this.
“We’re genuinely hopeful that our simulations will enhance the educational experience for medical trainees,” Eldredge told New Scientist. “But I’m really pleased just to get visceral reactions from my kids. That probably makes me a horrible father.”