{"title":"Scalings, Parameters and Variables","authors":"J. Grotberg","doi":"10.1017/9781139051590.003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1017/9781139051590.003","url":null,"abstract":"What are biofluids? There is a long list to answer this question, but a modest attempt would include: air, water, blood, mucus, urine, gastrointestinal (saliva, bile, chyme, stool), lymph, ocular (aqueous humor, vitreous humor), synovial, reproductive, cerebrospinal, milk, auditory and vestibular, intracellular, interstitial, venom, odorants, sap, nectar. These are fluids produced or used by living organisms. Of course, if we introduce a foreign fluid we need to consider it as a biofluid since it interacts with the organism. For example, perfluorocarbon liquids have been used as an artificial blood due to their ability to carry relatively large amounts of oxygen (Leach, 1996; Bull et al., 2009). They do not derive from a life form, but are inserted into one. So, one can think of a biofluid as a fluid involved in a living system. Medical devices and drug delivery often involve biofluid mechanics. An intravenous drip, artificial heart, coronary stent, mechanical ventilator, barium swallow, magnetic resonance imaging with contrast, and inhaled bronchodilator aerosols, are all examples of therapies and diagnostics involving biofluid mechanics and transport processes. The analysis of cells and molecules in microfluidic and array devices for high throughput also are dependent on the flow of fluids within the construct which carry the target objects (Huh et al., 2005; Whitesides, 2006; Tavana et al., 2009). Then there are fluids that are man-made from biological materials. This is most evident in the field of food processing, where biofluids such as mayonnaise, ketchup, apple sauce, peanut butter, melted chocolate and soft serve ice cream flow in pipes and devices to end up in containers or cones. What are some functions of biofluids? Life depends inherently on fluid mechanics. Land animals and plants are all immersed in the atmospheric air, for example. So we rely on it for oxygen and carbon dioxide exchange. The same is true for aquatic life forms, though their fluid is much more dense and viscous. Animals and plants also have internal fluids. In general, biofluids maintain internal milieu (chemicals, temperature); transport of metabolic gases, nutrients and waste; provide means of locomotion for finding food or prey, avoiding predators, mating, temperature regulation, migration; reproduction; protection; communication (mechanical, acoustic, chemical, visual). And one cannot view a frisky dolphin without acknowledging that biofluids can provide an outlet for “play.”","PeriodicalId":424042,"journal":{"name":"Biofluid Mechanics","volume":"8 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-07-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122948955","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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