Abstract
A multicompartment Taylor-Couette flow hemofilter was designed to remove toxins from a patient's bloodstream via immunoadsorption. This device (Vortex Flow Plasmapheretic Reactor, VFPR) treats blood plasma with a fluidized-bed of small (45-165 × 10-6 m diameter) particles, while protecting fragile blood cells from lysis. The potential application for the VFPR is dialysis-related amyloidosis, a disease associated with the systemic accumulation of beta-2-microglobulin in patients with long-term kidney failure. The equilibrium behavior of immunoadsorptive gel beads is characterized experimentally and theoretically using confocal microscopy and the Langmuir adsorption isotherm. The importance of external mass-transfer resistance within the active compartment is assessed through dissolution studies conducted with benzoic acid particles. These results are combined with mass-transfer fundamentals to develop a dynamic immunoadsorption model. The modeling results, without the use of adjustable parameters, agree with the experimental data and provide a foundation for further development and eventual application.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 2357-2365 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | AIChE Journal |
| Volume | 48 |
| Issue number | 10 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Oct 1 2002 |
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Biotechnology
- Environmental Engineering
- General Chemical Engineering