JP3730113B2 - Blood upper-layer liquid continuous separation and recovery device - Google Patents

Description

[0001]
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to an apparatus for continuously separating a large number of blood into an upper layer liquid and a cell component.
[0002]
[Prior art]
An apparatus for automatically separating cell components of blood and upper layer fluid (blood) has already been proposed by the present inventor (Japanese Patent Application No. 9-359012). In this apparatus, blood is injected into a U-shaped separation tube and centrifuged, and then the upper layer liquid is sucked and collected.
[0003]
[Problems of the Invention]
However, in order to automatically separate a large number of blood, blood is injected into a separation tube attached in the radial direction of a casing that is driven to rotate, centrifuged for a predetermined period of time, the upper layer liquid is sucked, and further, cell components It is necessary to perform the same one-cycle operation by injecting the next blood into one cycle and discharging the blood, washing the separation tube, and drying. If the above cycle is carried out with one separation tube attached to the casing, there is no particular problem. However, when multiple separation tubes are attached, there must be a separate inlet for injecting blood individually. If blood is mixed, it cannot be used, and a plurality of upper layer liquid suction ports are also required, which is not practical as an apparatus. On the other hand, only one separation tube is extremely inefficient as a separation and recovery device.
[0004]
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus that can efficiently separate blood using a plurality of separation tubes.
[0005]
[Means for solving problems]
In order to solve the above problems, in the present invention, an upper casing provided with a blood supply pipe, an upper layer liquid recovery pipe, a cell component and a washing liquid discharge pipe, a plurality of centrifuge tubes and a washing liquid reservoir are alternately arranged. The lower casing provided on the upper casing is rotationally driven so as to be able to perform index operation, and when the blood is separated by the separation tube, the upper layer liquid is sucked and collected from the separation tube, and the separation tube is washed and dried, the supply pipe of the upper casing is one end of the separation tube. The recovery pipe is inserted into one end of the separation pipe, the upper liquid suction pipe, the discharge pipe is connected to the other end of the separation pipe, and the supply pipe is connected to the cleaning liquid reservoir when the supply pipe is cleaned. It is.
[0006]
The centrifuge tube is substantially U-shaped, and is attached so that the U-shaped bent portion is on the outer side in the radial direction of the lower casing. One end of the separation tube is used as a blood supply port, and the supply port is connected to the bent portion. An upper layer liquid suction tube is inserted at an appropriate position of the tube, and an upper layer liquid separation detecting means is provided. The other end of the tube extending from the bent portion is used as a discharge port, and blood is centrifuged on the discharge port side of the bent portion. The tube is closed, and an opening / closing means is provided that can open the tube when the centrifugal separation is completed. When the detection means detects the separation of the upper layer liquid, the upper layer liquid is sucked and collected by the suction tube and the collection tube, and the opening / closing means is opened. The cell component can be discharged from the discharge port through the discharge pipe.
[0007]
One end of the supply pipe and the recovery pipe is opened on the upper surface of the upper casing so as to coincide with the rotation center axis of the upper casing, the other end is opened on the radially outer peripheral side of the lower surface of the upper casing, and one end of the discharge pipe is appropriately connected Insert into the container, extend the other end upward along the central axis of the upper casing and open it to the radially outer peripheral side of the lower surface of the upper casing. The one end opening of the separation tube, the one end opening of the upper layer liquid suction tube and the other end opening of the separation tube provided in the lower casing respectively correspond to the other end opening of the upper casing. It is good to make it open on the upper surface of a casing.
[0008]
Embodiment
Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings. As shown in FIG. 1, the upper-layer liquid separation and recovery device for blood includes a hollow disk-shaped upper casing 10 and a hollow disk-shaped lower casing 20 that are individually driven to rotate. The upper casing 10 has a pipe 11 at its central axis, extends rotatably through the lower casing 20, and a pulley 12 is fixed to a lower end portion of the upper casing 10. A timing belt is provided between the upper casing 10 and the pulley 13 of the transmission V. The casing 10 is rotated by the motor M via the transmission V. The central axis of the lower casing 20 is also a pipe 21, which is fitted on the pipe 11 of the upper casing 10, and a pulley 22 is fixed to the lower end thereof. The pulley 22 is connected to the pulley 23 of the motor M by a timing belt, and the casing 20 is rotationally driven by the motor M.
[0009]
The upper casing 10 has a supply pipe 14 whose one end opening 14a coincides with the central axis of the casing 10 and extends further downward, and similarly, a recovery pipe 15 whose one end opening 15a coincides with the central axis of the casing 10 and extends further downward. The supply pipe 14 and the recovery pipe 15 are provided so as to extend in the outer peripheral direction of the casing 10 and open to the lower surface of the casing 10, and other end openings 14 b and 15 b are formed. Further, a discharge pipe 16 extends over the entire length of the pipe 11, one end of which extends further in the outer peripheral direction of the casing 10 and opens on the lower surface to become an opening 16b for discharging cellular components, and the other end 16a is a suitable container. 17 etc. The openings 16b, 14b, 15b provided on the lower surface of the casing 10 are arranged in a line.
[0010]
As shown in FIGS. 4 to 6, a plurality (four in the figure) of U-shaped separation pipes 30 are arranged in the lower casing 20 at equal intervals, and a cleaning liquid is provided between adjacent separation pipes 30, 30. A reservoir 40 is provided. The separation tube 30 and the cleaning liquid reservoir 40 are connected to the suction port 25b, the injection port 24b, and the discharge port 26b connected to the openings 15b, 14b, and 16b provided on the lower surface of the upper casing 10, respectively. Openings 25c, 24c, and 26c are provided on the upper surface of the lower casing 20, respectively.
[0011]
As shown in FIGS. 1 and 4, the separation tube 30 includes a first liquid reservoir 31 communicating with the blood inlet 24b, and a second liquid reservoir adjacent to the first liquid reservoir 31 via a short conduit 31a. Liquid reservoir 32, a third liquid reservoir 33 provided via a U-shaped conduit 32a, and a discharge conduit 33a extending from the liquid reservoir 33. These liquid reservoirs 31, 32, 33 are substantially spindle-shaped and have different diameters from the other conduits 31a, 32a, 33a, but the large diameter portion shortens the overall tube length and other tubes. The small-diameter portion is for increasing detection accuracy to be described later.
[0012]
An upper layer liquid suction tube 25 is inserted into the first liquid reservoir 31. A guide cylinder 34 is attached in the third liquid reservoir 33, and a slide valve 35 is slidably accommodated in the guide cylinder 34. When the slide valve 35 is located at the right end of FIG. 1, the slide valve 35 is provided between the U-shaped conduit 32 a and the third liquid reservoir 33 and moved to the left end of the guide cylinder 34. The U-shaped conduit 32a and the third liquid reservoir 33 communicate with each other through the formed through hole 34a. Further, a detector 36 such as an optical sensor composed of a projector and a light receiver is disposed at a portion of the conduit 31a that connects the first liquid reservoir 31 and the second liquid reservoir 32.
[0013]
The operation of only the separation tube 30 as described above will be described with reference to FIGS. First, an anticoagulant is mixed with the collected blood and put into the inlet 24 b of the separation tube 30. At this time, the casing 20 has already been rotated. Therefore, the slide valve 35 having an appropriate weight is brought into close contact with the inlet 34b of the guide tube 34 by centrifugal force as shown in FIG. 7 (a), and the blood A is in the first and second liquid reservoirs 31, 32 and the U-shape. The conduit 32a is filled and held. In order to improve the sealing performance of the slide valve 35, it is preferable that the tip thereof is tapered and a tapered surface corresponding to the tip of the slide valve 35 is formed at the inlet 34 b of the guide tube 34.
[0014]
When the separation tube 30 rotates at a high speed, the lighter liquid component B is gradually separated from the blood A as shown in FIG. Then, when the separation of the liquid component B proceeds and the amount increases as shown in FIG. 7 (c) and reaches the narrow portion of the conduit 31a, the detector 36 detects this. Since the liquid component B is highly transparent, it can be easily detected by an optical sensor or the like. The first pump is driven by the detection signal, and the liquid component B, that is, the upper layer liquid is sucked out by the suction pipe 25 as shown in FIG. When it is detected by a timer that it has sucked out for a certain period of time, or when it is detected by the detector 36 that the cell component A ′ has flowed back to the thin conduit 31a (the cell component A ′ is difficult to transmit light, the detector 36 The state changes from on to off), the first pump is stopped and then the second pump drive signal is issued. The second pump sucks the inside of the third liquid reservoirs 32 and 33 from the discharge conduit 33a. Since this suction force is greater than the centrifugal force that causes the slide valve 35 to be in close contact with the inlet 34b of the guide cylinder 34, the slide valve 35 is configured so that the inlet 34b of the guide cylinder 34 is moved as shown in FIG. The U-shaped conduit 32a and the third liquid reservoir 33 communicate with each other through the through hole 34a, and the cell component A ′ is discharged through the discharge conduit 33a. When it is detected by a timer or the like that the cell component A ′ has been discharged, the second pump is stopped. As a result, the slide valve 35 again moves in the direction of the inlet 34b of the guide tube 34 by centrifugal force, and closes the inlet 34b.
[0015]
In addition, since blood is dark and has many cell components, and there are few liquid components B, it may be undetectable even if it does not reach the part of the detector 36 even by centrifugation. In that case, for example, a timer detects that a sufficient time has passed since the start of the centrifugation, and the second pump is first operated to suck the slide valve 34 and move it slightly in the direction of the discharge conduit 33a. Then, since both the cell component A ′ and the liquid component B move in the direction of the liquid reservoir 33, the liquid component B reaches the portion of the conduit 31a and the detector 36 operates. Therefore, the second pump may be stopped and the liquid component B may be recovered by the same operation as described above.
[0016]
Next, the third pump is driven to feed the cleaning liquid C into the separation tube 30 as shown in FIG. At this time, for example, the third liquid reservoir 33 is sucked by the second pump and the slide valve 35 is sucked, and the slide valve 35 is moved to the position of the stopper 34c of the guide cylinder 34 as shown in FIG. When the separation pipe 30 communicates with all the pipes and the cleaning liquid C is filled, the cleaning liquid C is sucked and flows by the second pump, so that the separation pipe 30 is completely cleaned. After washing, the separation tube 30 is dried by an appropriate means.
[0017]
As described above, a method for continuously and automatically performing the process of supplying blood to the separation tube 30, separating and recovering the upper layer liquid, and washing and drying by the plurality of separation tubes 30 will be described. Now, as shown in FIG. 9, numbers 1, 2, 3, and 4 are assigned clockwise to the separation tube 30 and the cleaning liquid reservoir 40 housed in the lower casing 20, respectively. First, the openings 15b, 14b, 16b (FIGS. 2 and 3) provided on the lower surface of the upper casing 10 are connected to the suction port 25b, the injection port 24b, the exhaust port communicating with the separation pipe 30-1 provided in the lower casing 20. Connect to outlet 26b. These openings can be connected in a liquid-tight manner. FIG. 10 shows the state. Thus, the blood supply pipe 14 and the upper layer liquid recovery pipe 15 of the upper casing 10 communicate with the first liquid reservoir 31 and the suction pipe 25 of the separation pipe 30 provided in the lower casing 20, respectively, and the discharge pipe 16 is a discharge conduit. 33a. In this state, the upper casing 10 and the lower casing 20 are rotationally driven by the motor M in synchronization. Then, the collected blood mixed with an anticoagulant (hereinafter referred to as collected blood) is supplied from the opening 14a. After a certain amount of supply, the transmission V is switched, the upper casing 10 is rotated rapidly, and the openings 15b, 14b, 16b of the upper casing 10 are aligned (indexed) with the connection ports 25c, 24c, 26c of the lower casing 20, At the same time, the transmission V is switched to synchronize with the rotational speed of the lower casing 20. As a result, the blood supply pipe 14, the recovery pipe 15, and the discharge pipe 16 of the upper casing 10 communicate with the cleaning liquid reservoir 40-1 of the lower casing 20. Therefore, in order to rotate the upper and lower casings 10 and 20 again in synchronism and wash the collected blood adhering to the supply pipe 14, the cleaning liquid is supplied from one end opening 14 a of the supply pipe 14 and discharged from the discharge pipe 16 through the liquid reservoir 40. Further, the supply pipe 14 is dried. Thereafter, the upper casing 10 is rapidly rotated, and the openings 15b, 14b, and 16b of the upper casing are indexed to the suction port 25b, the injection port 24b, and the discharge port 26b of the separation tube 30-2, and the upper and lower casings 10 and 20 are simultaneously rotated. Then, the next collected blood is supplied to the separation tube 30-2.
[0018]
Thus, in the first cycle, the separation pipe 30-1, the cleaning liquid reservoir 40-1, the separation pipe 30-2, the liquid reservoir 40-2, the separation pipe 30-3, the liquid reservoir provided in the lower casing 20 are stored. Openings 15b, 14b, and 16b provided on the lower surface of the upper casing 10 are sequentially indexed to the respective openings of the 40-3, the separation tube 30-4, and the liquid reservoir 40-4, and supply and supply of the collected blood to the separation tube The tube 14 is cleaned and dried.
[0019]
When the lower surface openings 15b, 14b, 16b of the upper casing 10 reach the separation tube 30-1, the rotation speed and timing are controlled so that the previously collected blood is already centrifuged. Therefore, as described above, the upper layer liquid B is sucked from the suction tube 25 provided in the separation tube 30 (FIGS. 7C and 7D) and recovered from the recovery tube 15. Further, in the same manner as described above (FIG. 8), the cell component A ′ is discharged from the separation tube 30-1, and the separation tube 30-1 is washed. At this time, since the cleaning liquid is supplied from the supply pipes 14 and 15 of the upper casing 10, these pipes 14 and 15 are also cleaned and simultaneously dried. Therefore, a new blood sample can be supplied to the separation tube 30-1. Next, indexing into the washing reservoir 40-1, washing the supply tube 14, indexing again into the separation tube 30-2, collecting, washing and drying the upper layer liquid and supplying new collected blood to the reservoir 40- The supply pipe 14 is washed by indexing to 2. That is, in the second and subsequent cycles, the upper layer liquid is collected, washed, dried, and freshly collected blood is supplied in the respective separation tubes 30-1, 30-2, 30-3, and 30-4. By repeating this operation, the collected blood can be continuously separated by a plurality of separation tubes.
[0020]
The number of separation tubes is not limited to the illustration. Further, the recovered upper layer liquid and cell components can be supplied as they are to an appropriate analyzer.
[0021]
【The invention's effect】
According to the present invention, as described above, since the collected blood can be automatically separated into the upper layer liquid and the cell component while continuously supplying the blood, the time required for blood analysis can be greatly reduced. In addition, it can greatly contribute to labor saving, and blood morphology measurement, biochemical analysis, immunological analysis, and the like can be performed simultaneously.
[Brief description of the drawings]
FIG. 1 is a longitudinal sectional view showing an example of a separation and recovery apparatus according to the present invention. FIG. 2 is a longitudinal sectional view showing an upper casing. FIG. 3 is a bottom view of the upper casing. 5 is a longitudinal sectional view of the other surface of the lower casing. FIG. 6 is a top sectional view of the lower casing. FIG. 7 is a longitudinal sectional view showing the operation of the separation pipe. FIG. 9 is a top view of the lower casing. FIG. 10 is a longitudinal sectional view showing the operation of the separation and recovery apparatus. FIG. 11 is a longitudinal sectional view showing the operation of the separation and recovery apparatus.
A Blood A 'Cell component B Upper layer liquid C Washing liquid M Motor V Transmission 10 Upper casing 11 Pipe 12, 13 Pulley 14 Supply pipe 14a, 14b Opening 15 Recovery pipe 15a, 15b Opening 16 Exhaust pipe 16a Other end 16b of the exhaust pipe Opening 17 Container 20 Lower casing 21 Pipe 22, 23 Pulley 24b Inlet 24c Connection port 25 Suction tube 25b Suction port 25c Connection port 26b Discharge port 26c Connection port 30 Separation tube 31 First liquid reservoir 31a Conduit 32 Second liquid reservoir 32a U-shaped conduit 33 Third liquid reservoir 33a Discharge conduit 34 Guide tube 34a Through hole 34b Inlet 35 Malide valve 36 Detector 40 Cleaning liquid reservoir

Claims (3)

An upper casing provided with a blood supply pipe, an upper layer liquid recovery pipe, a cell component and a washing liquid discharge pipe, and a lower casing provided with a plurality of centrifuge tubes and a washing liquid reservoir alternately are rotationally driven so that an index operation is possible. Separation of blood by the separation tube, recovery of the upper layer liquid from the separation tube, and cleaning / drying of the separation tube, the supply pipe of the upper casing is one end of the separation tube, and the suction tube is inserted into one end of the separation tube The blood upper layer liquid continuous separation and recovery apparatus, wherein the discharge pipe is connected to the other end of the separation pipe, and the supply pipe is connected to the washing liquid reservoir when the supply pipe is washed. The centrifuge tube is substantially U-shaped, and is attached so that the U-shaped bent portion is on the outer side in the radial direction of the lower casing. One end of the separation tube is used as a blood supply port, and the supply port is connected to the bent portion. The upper layer liquid suction tube is inserted at an appropriate position of the tube, and an upper layer liquid separation detection means is provided. The other end of the tube extending from the bent portion is used as a discharge port, and the blood centrifuge is placed on the discharge port side of the bent portion. An opening / closing means is provided that closes the tube during separation and can open the tube when centrifugation is completed. When the detection means detects the separation of the upper layer liquid, the upper layer liquid is sucked and collected by the suction tube and the collection tube, and the opening / closing means is provided. The apparatus for continuously separating and recovering the upper layer liquid of blood according to claim 1, wherein cell components are discharged from the discharge port through the discharge pipe. One end of the supply pipe and the recovery pipe coincides with the rotation center axis of the upper casing and opens on the upper surface of the upper casing, the other end opens on the radially outer peripheral side of the lower surface of the upper casing, and one end of the discharge pipe is appropriately Opened in the container, the other end extends upward in the center axis of the upper casing and opens to the radially outer side of the lower surface of the upper casing, and the other end opening of the supply pipe, the recovery pipe, and the discharge pipe is the lower surface of the upper casing. One end opening of the separation pipe, one end opening of the upper layer liquid suction pipe, and the other end opening of the separation pipe arranged in a row in the radial direction correspond to the other end opening of the upper casing, respectively. The blood upper layer liquid continuous separation device according to claim 1, wherein the blood upper layer liquid is separated from the upper surface of the blood.

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