CFD study of mesenchymal stem cells in fluid flow

Several biological effects have been reported for mechanical forces on individual cells including: signal transduction, gene expression, growth, and differentiation. In this paper, a novel model for studying the cell behavior under the effect of stresses is developed. A well-defined fluid flow passing over a single cell fixed inside a microchannel is considered in this model. By multi-scale modeling and fluid-structure interaction (FSI) method (which are strong tools in the field of cell mechanics)a single cell inside a microchannel (using its specific mechanical properties) have been simulated. For this purpose, at first, a 3D model of mesenchymal stem cells is created in a finite element software; by extracting the dimensions include surface area and volume of the nucleus and plasma membrane from literature. Then, the mechanical properties (Young´s modulus) of the cell are determined using an atomic force microscopy (AFM) in Hetrz model. The results of simulation results using computational fluid dynamics, arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian method and adaptive mesh procedure, beside providing a framework for characterizing cytoskeletal structure affecting the cellular responses, can substantially enrich studies in the field of cellular biomechanics. Comparison between the two cellular model have shown that the presence of cellular components widely affect its response to external mechanical forces.