The Transport of Nanoparticles in Blood Vessels: The Effect of Vessel Permeability and Blood Rheology

Abstract  The longitudinal transport of nanoparticles in blood vessels has been analyzed with blood described as a Casson fluid. Starting from the celebrated Taylor and Aris theory, an explicit expression has been derived for the effective longitudinal diffusion (D eff) depending non-linearly on the rheological parameter ξc, the ratio between the plug and the vessel radii; and on the permeability parameters and related to the hydraulic conductivity and pressure drop across the vessel wall, respectively. An increase of ξc or has the effect of reducing D eff, and thus both the rheology of blood and the permeability of the vessels may constitute a physiological barrier to the intravascular delivery of nanoparticles.