© 1999 Robert A. Freitas Jr. All Rights Reserved.

Robert A. Freitas Jr., Nanomedicine, Volume I: Basic Capabilities, Landes Bioscience, Georgetown, TX, 1999

9.4.1 Rheology of Nanorobot-Rich Biofluids

The study of biofluid flow, or biorheology, is useful in nanomedicine because it is necessary to understand the flow characteristics of fluids through which nanorobots must navigate -- whether a nanorobot is actively swimming or is simply drifting with the flow, or whether the nanorobot is traveling in an ordinary Newtonian fluid such as water or in more complex viscoelastic biofluids such as mucus or saliva. Additionally, the presence of large numbers of nanorobots may dramatically alter bloodstream viscosity (depending on nanorobot number density and shape), with important medical consequences. The following discussion examines biofluid and whole-blood viscosities (Sections 9.4.1.1 and 9.4.1.2), the radial distribution of blood elements in blood vessels (Section 9.4.1.3), viscosity and bloodstream velocity profiles of nanorobot-rich blood (Sections 9.4.1.4 and 9.4.1.5), and hematocrit reduction in narrow blood vessels (Section 9.4.1.6).

Last updated on 21 February 2003