Computational fluid dynamics investigation of a cavity micro-bioreactor

作者：Wei Tan, George A. Thouas, Mark C. Thompson, Kerry Hourigan · 年份：2007 · 研究领域：Microfluidic and Bio-sensing Technologies、Innovative Microfluidic and Catalytic Techniques Innovation、3D Printing in Biomedical Research

In this paper, cavity aspect ratios and fluid inflow velocities of an idealized perfusion cavity micro-bioreactor for embryos were examined using computational fluid dynamics simulations. Changes to aspect ratios led to altered flow structures and concentration distributions of fluid solutes within the cavity. When cavity aspect ratios were decreased to less than unity, the resulting transport of solutes was impaired, but relatively low shear stresses were found to be imposed on the enclosed embryo. Conversely, when aspect ratios were greater to than unity, more efficient solute transport was observed, however detrimentally increased levels of shear stresses were imposed on the embryo. Variation in solute concentrations within the cavity became very small as cavity aspect ratios were increased to larger than four. Changes of inflow velocities of fluid (culture medium) into the bioreactor were also found to have substantial impact on the flow structures and solute concentration distributions within the cavity. With low inflow velocities, fluid movement in the bioreactor were dominated by diffusion, with impaired solute transport within the cavity and relatively low shear stresses imposed on the embryo. Conversely, high inflow velocities caused fluid flow in the bioreactor to be dominated by advection, promoting solute transport but leading to relatively high shear stresses. The flow Peclet number (Pe) can be used to distinguish whether the flow is advection dominant (Pe > 1...