Dynamical Properties of Red Blood Cell Model in Shear Flow

Cells in a shear flow exhibit tumbling and tank-treading. This rotational movement is characterized by rotational frequency. In this work, we analyze and test a computational model of red blood cell by comparing simulated movement of a cell in a shear flow to the experimental data. We set up a computational experiment that recasts dynamical behavior of cells in a shear flow. We analyze the dependence of the rotational frequency of cells on the shear rate. Results show that the model including the stretching, bending, area and volume preservation moduli does not recover frequencies from the biological data. After adding the visco-elastic modulus, the simulations show compliance with the data.