This time, the blood is being prepared in the lab to prevent blood starvation. And it has already been introduced into the human body. And this is the world’s first clinical trial of artificial blood donation. This is what British researchers have claimed. A very small amount, to put it simply, only two spoonfuls of blood is used in this experiment. And this initiative has been taken to check whether the blood made in the lab is working properly in the human body.
In fact, blood donation is usually relied upon. But the necessary but rare blood group blood is always difficult to obtain in all cases. Blood is being made in the lab to avoid that problem.
Not only that, it is also very important for those who have to depend on blood donation all the time. For example, patients with sickle cell anemia. If the blood doesn’t match, the body refuses to accept the blood and the treatment fails. The more familiar A, B, AB, and O blood groups don’t have as much of a problem. But with some rare blood groups, the problem is serious. Professor Ashley Towe of the University of Bristol said some blood types are extremely rare. Maybe only 10 people are able to donate blood of this group in the country. Bombay blood group is one of the rarest blood groups. Which was first identified in our country. There are only three units of this type of blood in stock in the whole of Britain.
Read more: This time ‘Chakda Express’ is running in Mumbai, Anushka is like Jhulan’s shadow now!
How is this blood made?
The research project involved research teams from Bristol, Cambridge, London and NHS Blood and Transplant. The main focus of this study was on the body’s red blood cells, which carry oxygen from the lungs to the rest of the body.
How does it work?
It starts with simple blood donation. The amount of which is about 470 milliliters.
Magnetic beads are then used to find flexible stem cells capable of becoming red blood cells.
And such stem cells are grown in the lab.
This time red blood cells are made from those stem cells.
This process takes about three weeks to complete. About 50 billion red blood cells are initially made from half a million stem cells.
It is then filtered to remove about 15 billion red blood cells. Which is absolutely ready for transplant.
Professor Towe said in this context, “In this way, we want to produce as much blood as possible in the future. And through general blood donation, we must continuously increase the production of this blood through various machines.”
Read more: Disability in the accident! Sonu set a rare example of humanity by arranging his hands
Already the first two willing individuals have participated in the trial. However, the research team is thinking of testing the blood produced in this lab on 10 healthy volunteers. In this case, 5-10 milliliters of blood will be given twice every four months to the participants in this trial. One time will be normal blood, and the second time will be lab-made blood.
There will be a radioactive material with that blood. Which is usually used for medical purposes in some cases. Scientists will see how long the blood stays in the body through this material. Even researchers believe that lab-made blood is more potent than normal blood.
Red blood cells usually last 120 days before needing a transplant. Normally, donated blood contains a mixture of new and old red blood cells. There, lab-prepared red blood cells are regenerated, which last a full 120 days. The researchers also suspect that this will lead to smaller and more frequent blood donations in the future.
There are also some considerable financial and technical challenges. But the cost of blood production is very high. However, the research team has not yet told how much this cost will be. Not only that, there is another challenge. That is, the harvested stem cells gradually wear out on their own. which limits the amount of blood produced. More research is needed to produce more blood for clinical use.
Dr. NHS Blood and Transplant Medical Director of Transfusion. Farooq Shah said, “This groundbreaking research laid the foundation stone for the production of red blood cells. which can be implanted in the body of patients with diseases such as sickle cell anemia.”
Be the first to read breaking news on News18 Bangla. There are daily fresh news, live updates of news. Read the most reliable Bangla news on News18 Bangla website.
