Abstract

ARTIFICIAL BLOOD: A LIFE SAVING TOOL

*N M Phadke, D G Phadtare, R B Saudagar

ABSTRACT

Blood is a specialized body fluid that delivers necessary substances to the body cells such as nutrients and oxygen and transports waste products away from those cells .Artificial blood is a product made to act as a substitute for red blood cells. While true blood serves many different functions, artificial blood is designed for the sole purpose of transporting oxygen and carbon dioxide throughoutthe body. Depending on the type of artificial blood, it can be produced in different ways using syntheticproduction, chemical isolation, or recombinant biochemical technology.Artificial blood is supposed to fulfill some functions of biological blood, especially in humans. The initial goal of oxygen carrying blood substitutes mimics blood’s oxygen transport capacity. There is additional longer range research on true artificial RBCs and WBCs which could theoretically compose a blood substitute with higher fidelity to human blood. The basic approach to make an oxygen therapeutic is using Perfluorocarbons (a chemical compound which can carry and release oxygen).The artificial blood serves to be a good tool for the survival of patients at the time of surgery owing to high blood losses. Therefore the use of PFC solution as a blood substitute can be used to maintain the circulating blood volume as well as the need of the patients.

Keywords: Human Blood, Perflurocarbons, blood substitutes, oxygen therapeutics