Experimental and numerical study of platelets rolling on a von Willebrand factor-coated surface

• Published in: Medical engineering & physics Vol. 55; pp. 25 - 33
• Main Authors: Pujos, Justine S., Reyssat, Mathilde, Le Goff, Anne
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Elsevier Ltd 01.05.2018; Elsevier
• Subjects: Bioengineering; Biological Physics; Blood Platelets - chemistry; Blood Platelets - cytology; Cell Movement; Humans; Lab-On-A-Chip Devices; Life Sciences; Method of characteristics; Microfluidics; Models, Biological; Physics; Platelet; Rolling; Surface Properties; Transport; von Willebrand Factor - chemistry; Method of characteristics; PBS; Platelet; EFS; vWF; Rolling; PFA; Transport; Microfluidics; PDMS; SID
• ISSN: 1350-4533; 1873-4030
• DOI: 10.1016/j.medengphy.2018.03.005

•Adhesive particles flowing through a microchannel preferentially adhere to the channel entrance.•We develop a PDE-based model to describe the transport of adhesive microparticles flowing through a microchannel.•In the case of blood platelets flowing through a von Willebrand factor-coated channel, we show that the distribution of platelets on the channel surface is governed by advection, adsorption, desorption and shear-induced diffusion. Rolling is observed but its influence is negligible. Blood platelets circulate in the blood and adhere to wounded vessels to initiate coagulation and healing. The first step of this process is the capture of flowing platelets by adhesive molecules located at the wounded vessel wall. In this article, we study the transport of fixed blood platelets in a microfluidic channel coated with von Willebrand factor (vWF), a large multimeric protein expressed by endothelial cells in the vicinity of wounds. We measure the number of platelets adsorbed at the channel surface as a function of both time and space. Experimental results are compared with a new transport model. We show that transverse diffusion is an important feature of our model, while the rolling behaviour of the bounded platelets can be neglected.