Thursday, April 24, 2014

Artificial Blood for Transfusions

Original Article: Artificial Blood is Patient Ready
Article Source: www.the-scientist.com
Published: April 16, 2014
Written by: Jef Akst

Creative Commons Photo of
Red Blood Cells
Summary: Researchers at the University of Edinburgh and the Scottish National Blood Transfusion Service (SNBTS) have developed artificial red blood cells. They have done this by reprogramming the red blood cells grown from fibroblasts into mature red blood cells. This blood would be Type O blood, which is known as the universal donor and is relatively rare. This is the first time anybody has been able to create blood that fits within safety and quality standards to be transfused into a human being, which could happen as early as 2016. 

N.O.S. Themes:
  • Science is collaborative - many researchers worked together to develop this blood
  • Role of credibility - the researchers were from a well-established university
  • Role of change - as technology and knowledge progressed, scientists were able to figure out how to create blood
  • Role of motivation/curiosity - the scientists wanted to discover a more efficient source to get blood for blood transfusion patients which led them to conduct research

Thoughts: This could be a great new innovation in the medical society. Although currently it may be expensive, in the future maybe this technology could take over and no more blood donations would have to be made. How could this change modern medicine? What could be some implications? The article discusses how in 2016 this new process might already be used on patients with thalassaemia (when frequent transfusions are needed). I am curious to see what positives or negative could come out of this new technology.


Post Published: April 24, 2014 (11:45pm)
By: Julia Garbuz (hour 2)
Posted by at

1 comment:

  1. AnonymousApril 30, 2014 at 10:29 PM

    Great summary of this interesting article! Wow. This is an amazing innovation in the field of medical science. If no flaws emerge, it could be a revolutionary benefit to humankind. This site http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/real-life-true-blood-might-be-used-trial-transfusions-2016-180951139/?no-ist claims that, once its manufacturing process attains near-perfection, these manmade red blood cells will "be used as a plentiful, affordable and disease-free supply for blood transfusions." This brings up a great point: Since the red blood cells are artificially made, they will be free of disease. The monumentalism of this is that a disease that isn't easily detected won't get passed on to the patients, potentially saving thousands of lives. Another advantage of manmade blood cells, as stated by this website http://www.geneticliteracyproject.org/2014/04/16/lab-grown-blood-fit-for-human-transfusion-a-regenerative-medicine-first/, is that the effectiveness of the red blood cells can be maximized since scientists have control of the exact creation date of the cells. (Red blood cells typically have a 120 life cycle, so a patient could potentially receive an entire 120 supply of red blood cells from one transfusion.) Certainly, this development of manmade red blood cells in an impressive advancement in medical science.

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