Factors affecting sedimentational separation of bacteria from blood |
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| Authors: | William G Pitt Mahsa Alizadeh Rae Blanco Alex K Hunter Colin G Bledsoe Daniel S McClellan Madison E Wood Ryan L Wood Tanner V Ravsten Caroline L Hickey William Cameron Beard Jacob R Stepan Alexandra Carter Ghaleb A Husseini Richard A Robison Evelyn Welling Rebekah N Torgesen Clifton M Anderson |
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| Institution: | 1. Chemical Engineering Department, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah;2. Department of Microbiology and Molecular Biology, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah;3. Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah;4. Chemical Engineering Department, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates |
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| Abstract: | Rapid diagnosis of blood infections requires fast and efficient separation of bacteria from blood. We have developed spinning hollow disks that separate bacteria from blood cells via the differences in sedimentation velocities of these particles. Factors affecting separation included the spinning speed and duration, and disk size. These factors were varied in dozens of experiments for which the volume of separated plasma, and the concentration of bacteria and red blood cells (RBCs) in separated plasma were measured. Data were correlated by a parameter of characteristic sedimentation length, which is the distance that an idealized RBC would travel during the entire spin. Results show that characteristic sedimentation length of 20 to 25 mm produces an optimal separation and collection of bacteria in plasma. This corresponds to spinning a 12-cm-diameter disk at 3,000 rpm for 13 s. Following the spin, a careful deceleration preserves the separation of cells from plasma and provides a bacterial recovery of about 61 ± 5%. |
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| Keywords: | bacterial bloodstream infection bacterial separation centrifugation disk design E coli human blood sedimentation |
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