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Living Without a Pulse
SteamyMobile writes "Can you live without a pulse? Yes, now you can. The reason why we have a pulse is because it's hard for evolution to result in turbines or continuously spinning things. The next generation of artificial hearts may have no pulse. They also have no bearings, so they should last much longer than previous attempts. In fact, engineers don't give a predicted lifespan on these models. How would your life be different without a pulse?"
I wouldn't be able to tell how hard I'm exercising. Which brings up the point that these turbines are going to have to be variable speed if they're going to accommodate humans' varying oxygen needs.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
I'm sure someone will be adding their favorite politician to this thread but seriously - I'd put money that there will be some consequences to not having a pulse. Valves will not get the exercise they need or something. N million years of evolution (or 7 days of design if that is what you buy into) means that there are probably lots of subtle interdepenancies of a pulsating blood supply. Of course some of the consequences might well be good...
90% of the wealth is in 2% of the pockets. Bummer to be in the majority.
The again, not having a working heart at all would probably undermine those mechanisms as well...
I develped a pump for extracorporeal circulation of blood back in the mid 1970's and had to take a lot of these problems into account. My pump was pulsitile and had a very physiologic wave form including dichrotic notch. It also had 2 orders of magnitude less damage to red blood cells than the best pumps on the market at the time. (at least with the cow blood I experimented with) (Read on for an explanation of this) After spending a lot of money on patent lawyers, the device got shelved when I couldn't get a clear patent on it. I think people here on slashdot are missing the point of continuous (non-pulsitile) flow. The elasticity of the arteries especially the aorta actually adds to the pulsitile nature of blood flow. There is an artifact seen in blood pressure measurements called the dichrotic notch that is a direct result of this. If it is absent it is an indication that hardening of the arteries has taken place. The main purpose of circulation is to get blood to tissues and organs. Once there, it has to infiltrate the organs deeply in order to properly transfer oxygen and nutrients and carry away wastes. We were evolved with pulsitile flow and as a result the perfusion of organs and tissues is better with this type of fluid dynamic. That doesn't mean it won't work with constant flow, only that it won't be as efficient. It may take several years before these inefficencies result in some kind of problems. An increase in plaque deposition comes to mind because the tissues arent stretching and contracting. The other problem with turbines and impellers is the "waring blender effect" where the blood cells are "chopped up" by the spinning blades. This leads to hemolysis (release of hemoglobin into the blood form broken red blood cells) which puts a strain on the kidneys which aren't beilng perfused properly because of the non pulsitile flow, etc. etc. you get the picture. Anyway, it's interesting but not a permanent solution.