Latest Red blood cell Stories
What causes blood cells to deform, and how does deformation affect blood flow?Red blood cells, which make up 45 percent of blood, normally take the shape of circular cushions with a dimple on either side. But they can sometimes deform into an asymmetrical slipper shape. A team of physicists have used simulations to explore how fluid flow might be responsible for this deformation, as well as how the deformation in turn affects blood flow. The insights could help understand the mechanisms...
A team of Harvard chemists led by X. Sunney Xie has developed a new microscopic technique for seeing, in color, molecules with undetectable fluorescence. The room-temperature technique allows researchers to identify previously unseen molecules in living organisms and offers broad applications in biomedical imaging and research.The scientists' results are published in the Oct. 22 issue of Nature. Partial funding for the project was provided by the National Science Foundation (NSF).Fluorescence...
A gene with a significant effect on regulating hemoglobin in the body has been identified as part of a genome-wide association study, which looked at the link between genes and hemoglobin level in 16,000 people. The research was carried out by scientists from Imperial College London and published in Nature Genetics today. It shows a strong association between a gene known as TMPRSS6 and the regulation of hemoglobin.Hemoglobin is contained within red blood cells and is essential for...
Severe trauma patients requiring a major transfusion are twice as likely to die if they receive red blood cells stored for a month or longer, according to research published in BioMed Central's open access journal Critical Care. The increased rate of death was measured up to six months post transfusion which is consistent with previous reports in cardiac surgery patients.Philip Spinella and Christopher Carroll, both pediatric intensivists from Connecticut Children's Medical Center, Hartford,...
Children in Africa with sickle cell anaemia are dying unnecessarily from bacterial infections, suggests the largest study of its kind, funded by the Wellcome Trust. The results are published today in the journal the Lancet. The study has prompted calls for all children in Africa to receive vaccinations against the most common bacterial infections.Sickle cell anaemia affects millions of people worldwide, but more than eighty per cent of cases are in Africa, where 200,000 children are born with...
Researchers have identified a group of proteins that are targeted by parasites to cause malaria."This study reveals the identity of a novel protein trafficking apparatus ... and hence, provides an 'Achilles heel' for anti-malaria drug developers," Brendan Crabb at the Burnet Institute in Melbourne, Australia and colleagues wrote in the journal Nature.Researchers from Australia and the United States noted the discovery of an encasing vacuole that is located inside infected cells....
BETHESDA, Md., May 26 /PRNewswire/ -- New Health Sciences Inc. (NHSi) has won a two-year award of $1.9 million from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to develop a groundbreaking blood-storage system. The project aims to develop the Hemanext Anaerobic Storage Platform, which delivers higher quality blood for transfusion therapy and extends the shelf life of blood for transfusion. NHSi has demonstrated that this new technology can...
Clues about how blood forms could yield new strategies for treating blood diseasesBiologists have long wondered why the embryonic heart begins beating so early, before the tissues actually need to be infused with blood. Two groups of researchers from Children's Hospital Boston, Brigham and Women's Hospital, and the Harvard Stem Cell Institute (HSCI) -"“ presenting multiple lines of evidence from zebrafish, mice and mouse embryonic stem cells -"“ provide an intriguing answer: A beating...
For the first time, scientists have shown that amniotic fluid (the protective liquid surrounding an embryo) may be a potential new source of stem cells for therapeutic applications. The study was prepublished online on February 12, 2009, in Blood, the official journal of the American Society of Hematology."Building on observations made by other scientists, our research team wondered whether stem cells could be detected in amniotic fluid. We looked at the capacity of these cells to form new...
WASHINGTON, March 31 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- For the first time, scientists have shown that amniotic fluid (the protective liquid surrounding an embryo) may be a potential new source of stem cells for therapeutic applications. The study was prepublished online on February 12, 2009, in Blood, the official journal of the American Society of Hematology. "Building on observations made by other scientists, our research team wondered whether stem cells could be detected in amniotic fluid. We...
