Hemocompatibility of a hydrodynamic levitation centrifugal blood pump.
A noncontact type centrifugal pump without any complicated control or sensing modules has been developed as a long-term implantable artificial heart. Centrifugal pumps with impellers levitated by original hydrodynamic bearings were designed and have been modified through numerical analyses and in vitro tests. The hemolysis level was reduced by changing the pressure distribution around the impeller and subsequently expanding the bearing gap. Thrombus formation in the bearing was examined with in vitro thrombogenesis tests and was reduced by changing the groove shapes to increase the bearing-gap flow to 3% of the external flow. Unnecessary vortices around the vanes were also eliminated by changing the number of vanes from four to six.
Yamane
Takashi
T
Institute of Human Science and Biomedical Engineering, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, 1-2 Namiki, Tsukuba, 305-8564, Japan. yamane.t@aist.go.jp
Maruyama
Osamu
O
Nishida
Masahiro
M
Kosaka
Ryo
R
Sugiyama
Daisuke
D
Miyamoto
Yusuke
Y
Kawamura
Hiroshi
H
Kato
Takahisa
T
Sano
Takeshi
T
Okubo
Takeshi
T
Sankai
Yoshiyuki
Y
Shigeta
Osamu
O
Tsutsui
Tatsuo
T
D000818:Animals; D006354:Heart, Artificial; D006461:Hemolysis / Q000502:physiology*; D018056:Hemorheology / Q000295:instrumentation; D008422:Materials Testing; D011474:Prosthesis Design; D012756:Sheep; D013927:Thrombosis / Q000503:physiopathology*