The need for human packed red cells and serum components to alleviate or stem chronic disease states is paramount. When a human being is shot, or in a traumatic accident, or involved in a difficult birthing, blood products directly infused into the patient saves their life. The human dilemma of life remains complex and the population at large as donors shows infection by viruses notably Hepatitis B and the AIDS virus. As such, human populations are not good sources for transfusions. Only when dire consequences mandate should human blood products be acquired and used to save lives. The need for a synthetic blood source presses as the most important research topic in Medicine. This brief essay aims at providing the insight and inspiration to create such technology that yields a Eureka of logarithmic magnitude.
Human blood cells are biconcave disks coated with the protein spectra and invoked with an electric charge known as the zeta potential. Human blood cells are small and have no nucleus. The lifespan of human red blood cells in the body is approximately 120 days. Human blood cells are approximately seven microns in diameter; 45 mm cubed in volume, and holds a matrix of hemoglobin that complex to iron in the plus two oxidation state. The body uptake iron in the plus three oxidation state and converts it to the plus two oxidation state which readily binds oxygen in an electronegative van der Wahl’s reversible dissociation. The crux of research aims to secure a synthetic blood source with the above physical parameters
Pig Blood
Blood from an aseptically raised pig may provide a suitable donor for emergency situations. In the insulin molecule, pig differs from human in only one amino acid. Clinic studies show porcine insulin to be the most well tolerated foreign insulin for type one diabetics and similarly for donations of packed red blood cells, porcine allograph of red blood cells for short term therapy will be viable.
Polymerized hemoglobin
The chemical feat of linking hemoglobin molecules allied with iron molecules has been achieved. Unfortunately, polymerized hemoglobin clogs up the proximal nephron and puts the patient into renal failure directly and ultimately. Otherwise, polymerized hemoglobin functions famously in the intravascular compartment. Because free hemoglobin flows through the nephron filter without stopping and polymerized hemoglobin clogs up the kidney, the product is no longer used.
Genetic Engineering
The act of inserting the human ABO blood grouping system into porcine stem cells has not been tried. The protocol of inserting genes with Sendai virus shuttles or insertion of genetic material with micro capillary needles into the nucleus is old school technology. The problem lies in keeping pigs clean enough to be used as donors for human transplants. Pigs are farm animals.
Chloroplasts and the future
Chloroplasts are a plants equivalent of red blood cells. Although smaller in size then red blood cells, chloroplasts are large enough not to fall through the 180 nanometer sieve in the proximal glomerulus. Furthermore, the dissociative ligand binding oxygen in chloroplasts is magnesium in the plus two oxidation state. Whether the PKa of dissociation of oxygen for chlorophyll magnesium ion is similar to the dissociation PKa of iron hemoglobin has not been published in current medical textbooks. However, using chloroplasts instead of red blood cells is worth a clinical trial. The only drawback pertinent in using chloroplasts as donor cells is the green color imparted by the chlorophyll. Patients given emergency transfusions of chloroplasts as oxygen carriers might turn green and start to look like the Jolly Green giant of vegetable fame. Keeping plants aseptic and collecting chloroplasts remains far easier then advertising for human donors or fostering pigs in child care centers. The use of chloroplasts as blood RBC products, and maybe potentially as energy sources for hybrid human species, is part of the future and subsequent analysis and discussion.
The RBC and the chloroplast have similar physical parameters of around 7 microns. They are large enough not to slip through the fenestrations of the nephron. While current discourse states that the chloroplast cannot carry oxygen like the RBC, magnesium versus iron +3, they can produce oxygen when exposed to visible light predominantly in the red region of the visible spectrum. Therefore, infusing people with chloroplasts and irradiating them with visible light, the chloroplasts can produce enough oxygen for survival until a safe blood source acquires or the host replenishes the red cell mass. At this point it seems pertinent to administer prednisolone because the auxiliary property of this corticosteroid is to stimulate erythropoiesis. Like Thomas Edison states, “genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration’. Back to dog labs and federal high security prisons for subjects. An so it goes.