Parallel-plate flow chamber

Cell Adhesion to Immobilized Platelets Parallel-Plate Flow Chamber... 

Assemble the platelet-coated coverslip on a parallel-plate flow chamber which is then mounted on the stage of an inverted microscope equipped with a CCD camera connected to a VCR and TV monitor. 

The mechanical force most relevant to platelet-mediated thrombosis is shear stress. The normal time-averaged levels of venous and arterial shear stresses range between 1-5 dyn/cm2 and 6 10 dyn/cm2, respectively. However, fluid shear stress may reach levels well over 200 dyn/cm2 in small arteries and arterioles partially obstructed by atherosclerosis or vascular spasm. The cone-and-plate viscometer and parallel-plate flow chamber are two of the most common devices used to simulate fluid mechanical shearing stress conditions in blood vessels. 

Poortinga AT, Bos R, Busscher HJ. (1999). Measurement of charge transfer during bacterial adhesion to an indium tin oxide surface in a parallel plate flow chamber. Journal of Microbiological Methods 38 183-189. 

Roosjen, A., Kaper, H. J., Van Der Mei, H. C., Norde, W., Busscher, H. J. (2003). Inhibition of adhesion of yeasts and bacteria by poly(ethylene oxide)-brushes on glass in a parallel plate flow chamber. Microbiology, 149, 3239-3246. 

Parallel-plate flow chamber Shear stress Yes Possible presence of not fully developed laminar flow where fluid enters device Pressure varies linearly as a function of position, though this variation is often ignored as it is very small... 

Laminar flow devices are commonly used to characterize cell adhesion, and include rotating disc, parallel-plate (and variants), and radial-flow devices. These devices all employ tangential fluid flow to exert hydrodynamic drag and torque on adherent cells [98]. Among the different devices, the parallel-plate flow chamber (Figure 34.5a) is described most extensively, and has been used primarily to characterize cell and tissue phenomena under a well-defined hydrodynamic shear stress, r. Here, r can be predicted from fluid mechanics. 

Minor modifications have been made to the parallel-plate flow chamber geometry in order to produce a spatially dependent range of shear stresses across a single substrate. For example, a variable gap height device has been constructed in which /i is a linear function of the distance from the inlet, x (Figure 34.5b) [ 103 ]. In another device the width of the flow path varies inversely with distance from the inlet, w oc 1/x, to produce a Hele-Shaw flow pattern and a hydrodynamic shear stress that increases linearly with distance, t OCX [104,105]. 

Olivier, L. A. and Truskey, G.A., A numerical analysis of forces exerted by laminar flow on spreading cells in a parallel plate flow chamber assay, Biotechnol. Bioeng. 42,963,1993. 

FIGURE 15.4 (a) Parallel plate flow chamber systems apply homogeneous laminar shear stress, (b) Radial parallel plate flow chamber systems apply the highest shear stress near the center and minimum shear stress at the outer edge. 

Bacabac, R. G., T. H. Smit, S. C. Cowin et al. 2005. Dynamic shear stress in parallel-plate flow chambers. JBiomech 38 159-67. 

Brown, D. and R. Larson. 2001. Improvements to parallel plate flow chambers to reduce reagent and cellular requirements. BMC Immunol 2 9. 

Parallel Plate Flow Chamber. The parallel plate flow chamber (PPFC) is a design most frequently used to study vascular cells under flow conditions. Here, cell culture media is circulated through the chamber at adjustable flow rates creating a defined laminar flow (Fig. 15.2). 

Taite, L.J., Rowland, M.L., Ruffino, K.A., et al. Bioactive hydrogel substrates probing leukocyte receptor-ligand interactions in parallel plate flow chamber studies. Aim. Biomed. Eng. 34, 1705-1711 (2006). doi 10.1007/sl0439-006-9173-x... 

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