Event
ChBE Seminar Series: Panos Dimitrakopoulos
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
11:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m.
Room 2110 Chemical & Nuclear Engineering Bldg.
Professor Panos Dimitrakopoulos
(301) 405-8166
dimitrak@eng.umd.edu
Hemodynamics in the Microcirculation via Computational BioFluid Dynamics
Presented by Panos Dimitrakopoulos
Assistant Professor
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
University of Maryland
This talk considers distinct problems involving the hemodynamics in the microcirculation. In particular, I will discuss the nature of the hemodynamic forces exerted on vascular endothelial cells as well as on leukocytes, cancer cells or biofilm adhering to the inner surface of vascular vessels. The dynamics of red blood cells (RBCs) will also be considered; their motion through vascular microvessels has long been recognized as a fundamental problem in physiology and biomechanics, since the main function of RBCs is to exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide with the tissues which occurs in capillaries. In addition, I will present the efforts of my research group to develop efficient and accurate computational methodologies for the study of multi-length interfacial dynamics in Stokes flow, a challenging physical problem owing to the presence of multiple length scales which appear and affect the interfacial dynamics. Common examples constitute droplets/cells in close proximity to other cells or to vessels' walls as well as the appearance of tips and necks during large interfacial deformations in strong flows.
Prof. Panos Dimitrakopoulos received his Diploma degree in Chemical Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, and the degrees of Master of Science and Doctor of Philosophy (with option in Computational Science and Engineering) from the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana. After completion of his postdoctoral study at California Institute of Technology, he joined the faculty at the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Maryland. His research interests include multi-phase flows in bio/micro-fluidics, hemodynamics in the microcirculation, the dynamics of (bio)polymers as well as the development of efficient computational methodologies for the study of these physical systems. His research is supported by the National Science Foundation, the Petroleum Research Fund of the American Chemical Society, the Minta Martin Research Fund, the National Center for Supercomputing Applications in Illinois, and Sun Microsystems Inc.
