A new membrane formulation for modelling the flow of stomatocyte, discocyte, and echinocyte red blood cells

Abstract

In this work, a numerical model that enables simulation of the deformation and flow behaviour of differently aged Red Blood Cells (RBCs) is developed. Such cells change shape and decrease in deformability as they age, thus impacting their ability to pass through the narrow capillaries in the body. While the body filters unviable cells from the blood naturally, cell aging poses key challenges for blood stored for transfusions. Therefore, understanding the influence RBC morphology and deformability have on their flow is vital. While several existing models represent young Discocyte RBC shapes well, a limited number of numerical models are developed to model aged RBC morphologies like Stomatocytes and Echinocytes. The existing models are also limited to shear and stretching simulations. Flow characteristics of these morphologies are yet to be investigated. This paper aims to develop a new membrane formulation for the numerical modelling of Stomatocyte, Discocytes and Echinocyte RBC morphologies to investigate their deformation and flow behaviour. The model used represents blood plasma using the Lattice Boltzmann Method (LBM) and the RBC membrane using the discrete element method (DEM). The membrane and the plasma are coupled by the Immersed Boundary Method (IBM). Previous LBM-IBM-DEM formulations represent RBC membrane response based on forces generated from changes in the local area, local length, local bending, and cell volume. In this new model, two new force terms are added: the local area difference force and the local curvature force, which are specially incorporated to model the flow and deformation behaviour of Stomatocytes and Echinocytes. To verify the developed model, the deformation behaviour of the three types of RBC morphologies are compared to well-characterised stretching and shear experiments. The flow modelling capabilities of the method are then demonstrated by modelling the flow of each cell through a narrow capillary. The developed model is found to be as accurate as benchmark Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) approaches while being significantly more computationally efficient.

Contraction of the rigor actomyosin complex drives bulk hemoglobin expulsion from hemolyzing erythrocytes

“…1 ), fully matches those reported for the RBC damage during storage (Putter and Seghatchian, 2017 ). The only difference is that electroporation induces these morphological changes within few seconds, whereas the RBC storage lesions progress much more slowly over several weeks (Putter and Seghatchian, 2017 ; Geekiyanage et al, 2020 ; Karandeniya et al, 2022 ). The following sections analyze the mechanism of the self-propelled RBC motion using image-based cell tracking and cell velocimetry.…”

“…The mechanisms of hemolysis and related mechanical properties of erythrocytes have been the subject of numerous experimental and theoretical studies (Zhang and Brown, 2008 ; Klöppel and Wall, 2011 ; Boal, 2012 ; Faghih and Sharp, 2019 ; Wu et al, 2019 ; Craven et al, 2019 ; Asaro and Zhu, 2020 ; Horobin et al, 2020 ; Karandeniya et al, 2022 ). A recent study identified hemolysis as a key event in the clearance and turnover of billions of senescent erythrocytes per day in the spleen (Klei et al, 2020 ).…”

SARS-CoV-2 Impact on Red Blood Cell Morphology

“…− Tear cells (dacryocytes) are drop-shaped or pear-shaped erythrocytes with one large spicule with a blunt end. Cell size varies [9,10].…”

The influence of sepsis on erythrocytes morphology: case report and literature review

“…The changes which revealed the alteration of RBC morphology are detected later after the first 24 hours of induction of sepsis [ 14 , 15 ]. Finally, the presence of disintegrated erythrocytes and also RBC aggregates were observed [ 16 ].…”