Visualization and Measurement of Flow-Induced Dynamic Motion of Red Blood Cells Using Tracking Confocal Micro-PIV System

RBC(Red Blood Cell)s have a biconcave shape with diameters of about 8 μm and thicknesses of about 2 μm like a capsule structure with highly deformable membrane. In arterioles having diameters of less than 100μm, the effect of RBCs becomes pronounced because the scales of the flow and the RBCs become similar. RBCs exhibit the axial migration [1] toward the center of blood vessel. The axial migration leads to non-Newtonian flow behavior such as decrease in flow resistance. The tank-tread motion [2] makes an important role for the axial migration and it is dependent on the shear rate of the surrounding flow, which ranges up to 500 s⁻¹ in arteriole.