A workstation for visualization of fluid and particle motion in an enzymatic fluidized bed reactor for blood deheparinization

An integrated workstation for the study of fluid and particle motion in a fluidized bed reactor, which permits effective and safe drug removal within an extracorporeal system, was constructed. The main objective was to identify and investigate those flow conditions which yield high efficiencies of heparin removal and low levels of blood damage. The workstation, which can be used as a general-purpose fluid and particle motion analyzer, enabled the complex dependence of the overall reactor performance on flow conditions to be investigated at a microlevel. Its main features include real-time capture and analysis of video information, a user-friendly interface, graphics displaying various time-dependent flow parameters, and image-processing features for selecting the area and image contrast for visualization.<>