Continuous duty tonometer system

Abstract

This tonometer system, for equilibration of blood or other biological fluids, consists of a constant temperature bath which houses four independent tonometer flasks. Temperature stability is maintained by water circulating from the bath into a heating chamber and back. The tonometer flasks rotate continuously and spread the blood in a thin film, exposed to the desired gas mixture, which is prehumidified and flows continuously in and out of the flasks. The advantages of the system are as follows: 1) the temperature within the flasks is maintained to ± 0.01 C from the mean temperature; 2) withdrawal of an equilibrated aliquot does not require stopping the motion of the tonometer; 3) equilibration is rapid in comparison to other methods for the same volume of blood; 4) large amounts of blood can be equilibrated; and, foremost, 5) contamination of the sample with air can easily be avoided. blood equilibration Submitted on October 15, 1964