Physiologic inspired channel design to study flow behavior of red blood cells

The blood flow dynamics through the micro-vascular system, which is the end of our vascular system, depends on many factors, such as the exact shape of the vessels, the aggregation and disaggregation and deformation of the red blood cells (RBCs) [1]. The blood flow has been studied for a long time. The field got a boost with the introduction of microfluidics, which allowed to study the effects of these parameters systematically, mostly using 2D channels with rectangular cross section, very different from the physiological vessels.The goal of this research project is to understand the interplay between aggregation, deformation and flow in model 3-D microfluidic channels as well as physiologically relevant shaped channels. We used a novel technique, Selective Laser-induced Etching (SLE), to produce 3D structures in glass. Here we present first results on the effect of bifurcations into different planes with any variable shape [2]. To study the shape memory of the vessels the second generation of the bifurcation has been implemented with a parallel and perpendicular orientation relative to the first bifurcation

A polarized 3He Target for the Exploration of Spin Effects in Laser-induced Plasmas

In order to investigate the polarization degree of laser-accelerated 3He ions from a polarized 3He gas-jet target, several challenges have to be overcome. One of these is the development of an appropriate polarized 3He gas-jet target. Since our experiments are carried out at the PHELIX Petawatt Laser Facility, GSI Darmstadt, the layout of the set-up has to cope with the available space within the PHELIX target chamber. The essential components of such a layout are a magnetic holding field for storing polarized 3He gas inside the vacuum chamber for many hours, the gas-jet source for providing the desired laser target, and finally, a polarimeter for measuring the spin-polarization degree of laser-accelerated 3He2+ ions