Volume conductor model
The volume conductor model is the numerical core of OSS-DBSv2. It combines the geometry, tissue properties, stimulation signal, and solver configuration to compute electric potentials and fields in the simulated domain.
Role in the workflow
Most standalone and Lead-DBS-driven runs eventually reach the same core steps:
build the geometry and mesh
assign conductivity information from MRI and optional DTI data
define boundary conditions at electrode contacts and outer surfaces
solve the resulting finite-element system
export fields, impedance estimates, and pointwise analyses
Floating and non-floating contacts
OSS-DBSv2 distinguishes between several conductor variants:
VolumeConductorNonFloatingfor standard active and passive contact setupsVolumeConductorFloatingwhen floating contacts are presentVolumeConductorFloatingImpedancewhen floating contacts also carry surface impedance information
These variants share the same general workflow but differ in how contact boundary conditions are enforced.
Mesh and linear algebra
The volume conductor stack also includes:
mesh generation and mesh reuse utilities
conductivity coefficient functions derived from the material model
iterative and direct solvers
several preconditioner strategies for larger problems
For most users, the default settings are sufficient to begin with. Solver and preconditioner tuning becomes more relevant for large anisotropic models, high resolution meshes, or systematic parameter studies.