Oxygen transport modeling in extracorporeal membrane oxygenators with sinusoidal fiber morphology

Extracorporeal membrane oxygenator (ECMO) is a vital life support system that assists patients suffering from severe respiratory or cardiac failure by redirecting the blood outside the body to an artificial oxygenator, promoting the removal of carbon dioxide and the exchange of oxygen. Depending on the severity of the patient's underlying medical condition, the survival rate for ECMO treatment might vary significantly but is generally reported to be around 60-70%. Hypothermia, disease severity, and hemorrhage followed by thrombosis reduce the ECMO treatment's survival rate.High blood prime volume is used in ECMO to increase patients' efficient gas exchange and sufficiently fill the extracorporeal circuit. However, this practice raises the potential risk of bleeding. Therefore, an efficient way of increasing gas exchange without changing the prime volume is desired. Inspired by nature, it was found that micro-ridges in fish's gills increase the respiratory surface and subsequent gas exchange.This study presents modeling of the oxygen transfer in ECMO with cylindrical and sinusoidal fiber shapes and investigates the hemodynamic properties of each case.