In
July last year, the American Red Cross declared an emergency blood shortage - it simply wasn't receiving enough donations to help all
the patients that needed blood. Now, researchers from the University of British
Columbia may have found a way to address the problem, even if people aren't
donating more: convert a less-usable blood type into one that anyone can
receive.
Last
August, they presented their research at
a meeting of the American Chemical Society, and now the results have been
published in the journal Nature Microbiology.
Blood
types are different because of the sugars on the surface of the red blood cells
the body creates. Type A has one type of sugar and Type B has another; Type AB
has both sugars. Type O doesn't have any sugars.
If
a person receives a blood transfusion of a blood type that's not their own,
their immune system will attack and kill the donated blood cells.
For
example, a person with Type A blood could never receive a Type B donation
because their system would simply reject the new blood because the sugars
aren't quite right.
Because
Type O blood doesn't carry any sugars, anyone can receive it - it's the
universally accepted blood type and, therefore, highly desirable.
In
the past, researchers figured out that certain enzymes (molecules that cause
chemical reactions) could remove the sugars from A, B, and AB blood cells,
converting them into the more useful Type O.
Learn
more here.