Microcirculation

Dynamics of individual red blood cells in the microcirculation.

Principal investigators:
A. Viallat; A. Charrier; E. Helfer

Postdocs: F. Yaya

The efficient and sustainable circulation of blood cells in the vasculature is a physical tour de force. First, blood cells never form aggregates susceptible to clog blood vessels. Second, red blood cells combine robustness and high deformability to squeeze through the smallest capillaries. Although evolution has succeeded in finding the suitable physical parameters that ensure a proper vascular circulation, we are today unable to predict, understand, and artificially reproduce individual and collective behaviors of blood cells in the vasculature.

We study how the mechanical properties of individual red blood cells govern their motion in shear flow

We develop a microfluidic device containing submicron slits mimicking interendothelial splenic slits to study the stringent mechanical fitness test that red blood cells pass in the spleen.

We develop mechanical markers for the clinical follow-up of sickle cell disease and pathologies affecting red blood cell deformability.