Dresden 2020 – scientific programme
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BP: Fachverband Biologische Physik
BP 20: Poster VIII
BP 20.21: Poster
Tuesday, March 17, 2020, 14:00–16:00, P2/4OG
The Structure of Red Blood Cells' Aggregates — •Mehrnaz M. Babaki1,2 and Minne Paul Lettinga1,2 — 1ICS-3 Soft Condensed Matter, Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, Jülich, Germany — 2Laboratory for Soft Matter and Biophysics, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
Red Blood Cells (RBCs) aggregate in blood plasma due to presence of proteins like fibrinogen, immunoglobulin M and C-reactive protein. The characteristic face-to-face morphology of RBC's aggregates is similar to stacks of coins, which is referred to as rouleaux. The first step in understating rouleaux formation is the aggregation of two RBCs, which is called doublet. The formation and shape of a doublet is governed by bending and shear elasticity and adhesion energy of RBCs.
We induce aggregation of RBCs by adding different type of particles to RBCs dispersed in a density matched buffer. The ideal long rage attraction is induced by rod-like fd-viruses. Rode-like fd-viruses with a high length to diameter ratio are used as a depletant agent. The interaction is tuned by varying the concentration of the fd-virus. We employ ultra-fast confocal microscope to image the aggregates of RBCs to investigate the 3D shape of doublets.
By increasing the concentration of fd-virus, we observe a transition between line contacted doublets, where RBCs do not deform but touch along a circle, to doublets, where individual RBCs deform and are in full contact. The full surface contacted doublets can have different shapes which we developed a fingerprint to distinguish between these shapes.