Electrohydraulic Pump-Driven Closed-Loop Blood Pressure Regulatory System

An electrohydraulic (EH) pump-driven closed-loop blood pressure regulatory system was developed based on flow-mediated vascular occlusion using the vascular occlusive cuff technique. It is very useful for investigating blood pressure-dependant physiological variability, in particular, that could identify the principal mediators of renal autoregulation, such as tubuloglomerular feedback (TGF) and myogenic (MYO), during blood pressure regulation. To address this issue, renal perfusion pressure (RPP) should be well regulated under various experimental conditions. In this paper, we designed a new EH pump-driven RPP regulatory system capable of implementing precise and rapid RPP regulation. A closed-loop servo-controlwas developed with an optimal proportional plus integral (PI) compensation using the dynamic feedback RPP signal from animals. An in vivo performance was evaluated in terms of flow-mediated RPP occlusion, maintenance, and release responses. Step change to 80 mmHg reference from normal RPP revealed steady state error of ${\pm}3%$ during the RPP regulatory period after PI action. We obtained rapid RPP release time of approximately 300 ms. It is concluded that the proposed EH RPP regulatory system could be utilized in in vivo performance to study various pressure-flow relationships in diverse fields of physiology, and in particular, in renal autoregulation mechanisms.