Dissociation of red blood cell aggregates in extensional flow

Blood rheology and microcirculation are strongly influenced by red blood cell aggregation. We investigate the dissociation rates of red cell aggregates in extensional flow using hyperbolic microfluidic constrictions and image analysis by a convolutional neural network (CNN). Our findings reveal that aggregate dissociation increases sharply when a critical extension rate is reached which falls within the range of microcirculatory conditions, suggesting that large variations of aggregate sizes should be expected in-vivo. This work contributes to a deeper understanding of the behavior of red blood cell aggregates in response to extensional stress in microcirculatory networks, provides crucial experimental data to validate theoretical and numerical models, and constitutes the basis for improved evaluation of blood aggregability in clinical contexts.