Date of Award

Summer 1999

Document Type

Thesis - Restricted

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Biomedical Engineering

First Advisor

Olson, Lars E.

Second Advisor

Linehan, John H.

Third Advisor

Dawson, Christopher A.

Abstract

Pulmonary endothelial cells line the luminal side of blood vessels in the lung. Since the entire cardiac output passes through the pulmonary circulation, the pulmonary endothelium is well situated to perform many regulatory functions. This thesis is an ongoing study of a novel function of pulmonary endothelial cells. In it, a mathematical model that includes the hypothesized reactions occurring to thiazine compounds upon their transit through an isolated rabbit lung was derived. The model was numerically fit to experimental data and the sensitivity and identifiability of each parameter of the model was determined. Chapter I contains an introduction to this topic by providing an overview of transplasma membrane electron transport (TMET) and how thiazine dyes are probes for pulmonary endothelial TMET. Also, some prior mathematical models of studies of pulmonary endothelial function are included. Chapter II describes in detail the materials, experimental set-up, and methods used to acquire and analyze the experimental data from lungs. Chapter II along with Appendix A gives an in-depth derivation of the mathematical model used in this thesis. Chapter Ill describes the results obtained from modeling the experimental data of isolated rabbit lungs using the methods from Chapter II. Chapter IV discusses how well the model fits the data and to what degree the hypothesized mechanisms are consistent with the data. Limitations with modeling data of the type collected and parameter correlation issues are also discussed.

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