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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2018 Jul 1.
Published in final edited form as: Microcirculation. 2017 Jul;24(5):10.1111/micc.12357. doi: 10.1111/micc.12357

Figure 4.

Figure 4

Sickle cell blood flow in the microvasculature is dependent on oxygen tension. Representative sickle blood in our microvasculature mimic at 10X magnification (A–C) and at 40X magnification (D–F) shows differences in flow velocity depending on oxygen tension. At constant, high oxygen gas tensions (160mmHg) blood flow is fast flowing and similar to healthy, non-sickle patient blood samples (A,D). At constant, low oxygen gas tensions (0mmHg) blood flow becomes impaired and nearly completely occludes (B,E). Here, many of the channels appear to occlude upstream of the capillaries. When an oxygen gas tension gradient is imposed, 91mmHg to 0mmHg in this case, sickle blood velocity again becomes impaired, but is highly sensitive to patient and sample variation (C,F). In all images, a Soret band filter was utilized to show relative hemoglobin saturation. Lighter intensities indicate higher oxygen saturation and darker intensities represent low oxygen saturation. Scale bars are 200μm in (A–C) and 50μm in (D–F).