(316c) Dissipative Particle Dynamics with Diffusion and Reaction: Application to Blood Clotting

Dissipative Particle Dynamics (DPD) is well-understood to be appropriate for the simulation of flow phenomena at the mesoscopic level. Frequently these are strongly affected by events at much smaller scales, e.g. oxygen transport to red blood cells (RBCs).To account for these smaller scale processes we have incorporated diffusion and reaction of multiple species into an extended version of DPD. At the continuum level this is equivalent to the Navier-Stokes equation plus one diffusion-convection equation for each species. Clot initiation and growth at a damage site on a blood vessel wall involves a number of simultaneous processes including: multiple chemical reactions, species diffusion and flow. The chemistry of clot initiation and growth is now understood to be determined by mechanisms involving many reactions among some two-dozen species in dilute solution. Approximate diffusion coefficients in plasma can be estimated from correlations, while bulk and surface reaction-rate constants are available from the literature. Here the extended DPD is used to simulate the initiation and growth of a clot on a vessel wall. The role of blood particulates, i.e. RBCs and platelets, in the clotting process is beings studied by including them separately and together in the simulations.