WEBVTT - The Future of Blood! 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:07.200 Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to 0:00:07.400 --> 0:00:15.160 Forward Thinking, says everyone, And welcome to Forward Thinking, the 0:00:15.280 --> 0:00:17.880 podcast that looks at the future and says, take a 0:00:17.880 --> 0:00:20.200 little walk to the edge of town and go across 0:00:20.239 --> 0:00:23.640 the tracks. I'm John in Strickland, I'm Lauren, and I'm 0:00:23.720 --> 0:00:27.680 Joe McCormick. So Hey, guys, Hey, how you doing today? 0:00:27.840 --> 0:00:32.400 I'm well, pretty okay. How would you be doing if 0:00:32.400 --> 0:00:35.480 there was no blood in your body? Less? Well, yeah, 0:00:35.520 --> 0:00:39.080 pretty poorly overall. And blood is pretty awesome for keeping 0:00:39.159 --> 0:00:42.120 us alive. Uh, it's kind of an integral for that 0:00:42.159 --> 0:00:44.960 whole oxygen carbon dioxide exchange thing that we would depend 0:00:45.040 --> 0:00:48.440 upon so much for life. Also kind of squishy, I mean, 0:00:48.479 --> 0:00:54.000 without blood, we would be significantly less squishy, less voluminous. Yeah, yeah, 0:00:54.040 --> 0:00:56.080 we'd probably be a little more like a you know, 0:00:56.240 --> 0:01:03.520 raisins and be kind of beird across the line as well. 0:01:03.560 --> 0:01:06.120 Today we wanted to talk about blood and the future 0:01:06.160 --> 0:01:09.200 of blood and why blood is awesome and very interesting, 0:01:09.640 --> 0:01:12.840 perhaps even more interesting than you might realize, even if 0:01:12.959 --> 0:01:17.080 you are a vampire. Yes, Aura, as you have mentioned 0:01:17.080 --> 0:01:21.200 in the notes, a certain Elizabeth Bathory, although that a 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:27.360 lot of the the legends attributed to her are possibly apocryphal. Yes, yeah, 0:01:27.400 --> 0:01:30.080 so we I don't think we actually have historical proof 0:01:30.160 --> 0:01:33.160 that she bathed in blood. But she was a countess 0:01:33.160 --> 0:01:35.200 who did many, many horrible things. And why are we 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:39.200 talking about her on this podcast. Maybe we shouldn't because 0:01:40.040 --> 0:01:46.399 because it leads into another cool cross promotional opportunity. Joe, Yeah, yeah, 0:01:46.400 --> 0:01:48.960 Elizabeth Bathory is not the only one who might have 0:01:49.120 --> 0:01:52.800 bathed in blood. Our our own Lauren Vogel Bomb has 0:01:52.840 --> 0:01:56.720 bathed in blood. It wasn't a bath. It was more 0:01:56.760 --> 0:02:00.280 like a shower, and it wasn't wasn't voluntary, right, You 0:02:00.320 --> 0:02:03.680 were being splashed by it, and it wasn't real blood. 0:02:03.840 --> 0:02:07.120 It was fake stage blood, right. But it was all 0:02:07.160 --> 0:02:09.440 because you did a show on on brain Stuff, an 0:02:09.440 --> 0:02:12.280 episode of brain Stuff where you participated in an episode. 0:02:12.280 --> 0:02:15.280 It was all about blood and why it's red, right, correct, Yeah, 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:17.079 it was. It was about the color of blood and 0:02:17.400 --> 0:02:21.680 the different chemicals in different creatures that create colors of blood. 0:02:21.720 --> 0:02:23.520 And in order to do all of this, we really 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:27.200 wanted Dr Anton Jessip, who is a host over on 0:02:27.240 --> 0:02:31.240 Stuff to blow your mind are resident monster expert. Indeed, 0:02:31.480 --> 0:02:36.000 he is from the university basement. Um and uh he 0:02:36.000 --> 0:02:39.040 he had an experiment to run. Um. I was there 0:02:39.120 --> 0:02:42.160 in a prom dress. You know. I was trying to 0:02:42.280 --> 0:02:48.200 encourage your telekinetic powers. Opportunity knocked and Dr Jessip answered yes, 0:02:48.560 --> 0:02:50.800 and thus we have the video. If you'll haven't checked 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:53.760 out the YouTube channels for brain stuff and for stuff 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:56.239 to blow your mind, you definitely should. They got great 0:02:56.280 --> 0:02:58.760 stuff going on there. And Lauren, one more question before 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:00.960 we get into the future of blood. Yes, surely. In 0:03:01.000 --> 0:03:04.880 your brainstuff video you concluded that the reason blood appears 0:03:04.880 --> 0:03:08.480 blue through your skin is because when blood is deoxygenated, 0:03:08.600 --> 0:03:13.080 it turns blue. Right. That is so completely incorrect. No, No, 0:03:13.240 --> 0:03:15.920 blood is always red, even when it is inside your body, 0:03:15.960 --> 0:03:19.440 Isn't It is an optical illusion that it looks blue 0:03:19.480 --> 0:03:22.640 in your veins. It's it's how light scatters through your skin. 0:03:23.360 --> 0:03:25.919 And uh and it is a darker, deeper red when 0:03:25.960 --> 0:03:29.400 it's in your veins. However, it's still red. So so 0:03:29.440 --> 0:03:31.480 you're telling me that all those British blue bloods are 0:03:31.600 --> 0:03:35.560 are actually red bloods. They're totally red blood unless they're 0:03:35.600 --> 0:03:40.360 actually telekinetic crab monsters, in which case their blood is 0:03:40.360 --> 0:03:43.840 probably blue because a lot of other creatures like for example, 0:03:44.000 --> 0:03:49.000 cephalopods and crustaceans do have blue blood. Well, we'll focus 0:03:49.040 --> 0:03:52.080 on human blood. Yeah, tomorrow is when we record the 0:03:52.080 --> 0:03:55.440 podcast about the crab Monsters. Today we need to talk 0:03:55.440 --> 0:03:59.960 about blood technology. So there's actually a really fascinating future 0:04:00.040 --> 0:04:02.160 around blood and one of the first things we wanted 0:04:02.200 --> 0:04:05.360 to talk about was the idea of artificial blood. So 0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:08.120 before we get into the actual science, I have to 0:04:08.520 --> 0:04:10.600 I know that we've just been doing tangents all the 0:04:10.640 --> 0:04:13.000 way leading up into this podcast, but this this is 0:04:13.000 --> 0:04:15.120 one of those things where the first time I really 0:04:15.760 --> 0:04:18.360 uh started thinking about artificial blood was when I watched 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:21.520 a super cheesy horror movie. Have you guys ever seen 0:04:22.200 --> 0:04:25.760 Sundown The Vampire in Retreat? I have not. It's the 0:04:25.920 --> 0:04:29.520 Vampire in Retreat. Yes, not the vampire retreat, like it's 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:32.640 a resort that they go to. Well, it's almost like that, 0:04:32.680 --> 0:04:34.919 because the idea is of the vampire that there's a 0:04:34.920 --> 0:04:37.479 colony of vampires who have settled a town in in 0:04:37.480 --> 0:04:41.760 in the West, and it's kind of a vampire Western 0:04:42.000 --> 0:04:46.960 mash up movie. And Bruce Campbell plays the descendant of 0:04:47.040 --> 0:04:51.240 Van Helsing in this um and uh, I believe David 0:04:51.320 --> 0:04:54.600 Carradine is the leader of the vampires. Yeah, that sounds 0:04:54.720 --> 0:04:59.560 high class. This phenomenal movie. I saw it when it 0:04:59.600 --> 0:05:02.920 was on cable back in the you know, nineties or something. 0:05:02.920 --> 0:05:06.800 But anyway, the plot of the movie partially revolves around 0:05:06.839 --> 0:05:09.400 the fact that that the vampire colony is made up 0:05:09.440 --> 0:05:11.719 of two different camps, and one camp is trying to 0:05:12.279 --> 0:05:16.960 get away from the typical vampireism thing by creating artificial 0:05:17.000 --> 0:05:20.080 blood as a blood substitute that they will drink, therefore 0:05:20.360 --> 0:05:22.719 they will no longer have to prey upon the living. 0:05:23.160 --> 0:05:26.680 The other camp is more like, Ah, we're superior predators 0:05:26.720 --> 0:05:29.880 and we should be you know, preying upon people. That's 0:05:29.920 --> 0:05:32.880 what we should be doing. Uh. And it wasn't at 0:05:32.880 --> 0:05:35.719 the time. I was thinking, h artificial blood, that actually 0:05:35.760 --> 0:05:38.800 would be incredibly useful, right, I Mean, there's there's an 0:05:38.839 --> 0:05:44.599 actual need your blood in so many different medical procedures 0:05:44.640 --> 0:05:47.960 just for vampires. So you're not just talking about artificial blood. 0:05:48.080 --> 0:05:50.760 Is in movie blood something that looks like blood. We're 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:54.520 talking about something that performs the anatomical function of blood. 0:05:54.600 --> 0:05:56.679 Right at the very least and and for the most 0:05:56.760 --> 0:05:59.920 part throughout history, the thing that people have been trying 0:06:00.040 --> 0:06:03.279 to develop is an artificial blood that can, in fact, 0:06:03.800 --> 0:06:09.760 uh handle that oxygen carbon dioxide exchange that we need 0:06:09.800 --> 0:06:12.680 in order to survive. Now, blood does other stuff too. 0:06:12.720 --> 0:06:16.760 It's not just a vehicle for carrying oxygen and carbon dioxide. 0:06:17.120 --> 0:06:18.599 That's a big part of it. But because all of 0:06:18.600 --> 0:06:21.280 your all of your organs need oxygen in order to function, 0:06:21.520 --> 0:06:24.960 and they get oxygen because red blood cells contain the 0:06:25.000 --> 0:06:28.520 stuff called hemoglobin that binds to the oxygen in your 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:32.719 lungs and then proceeds to carry it throughout your bodily systems. Yeah, 0:06:32.839 --> 0:06:36.000 so exactly, And and that's the main thing that the 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:39.240 artificial blood types have been you know, people have been 0:06:39.240 --> 0:06:41.640 trying to find something that could do that as well 0:06:41.680 --> 0:06:46.400 as blood can. And it's interesting that the history of 0:06:46.440 --> 0:06:50.760 looking into artificial blood stretches back quite a long ways 0:06:51.360 --> 0:06:54.400 to the point where we're going. Before um, we had 0:06:54.440 --> 0:06:57.240 a lot of scientific knowledge about blood and what it 0:06:57.320 --> 0:07:00.640 does and what it's capable of doing. The sleep people 0:07:00.720 --> 0:07:02.960 just saying hey, I wonder what would happen if we 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:05.720 put this in us instead? Well, blood is one of 0:07:05.760 --> 0:07:09.400 the four humors, right, I mean, that's still solid science 0:07:09.480 --> 0:07:12.600 right then it's well, it's not solid science science, but yes, 0:07:12.640 --> 0:07:15.200 it was one of the humors. Um. So if you 0:07:15.320 --> 0:07:20.720 look back to the seventeenth century, William Harvey was the 0:07:20.760 --> 0:07:24.760 first to examine the circulatory system and describe exactly how 0:07:24.840 --> 0:07:29.920 blood moves through the body. Uh, And the physicians of 0:07:29.960 --> 0:07:32.920 that day decided to experiment with various substances as blood 0:07:32.960 --> 0:07:38.320 substitutes for people who would need blood for any particular reason. Um. 0:07:38.360 --> 0:07:42.440 And that would include stuff like milk, beer, urine, and 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:48.120 sheep blood. I think beer was the really popular one. Well, 0:07:48.360 --> 0:07:50.160 beer was popular for a lot of reasons and that 0:07:50.640 --> 0:07:53.240 in the seventeenth century. But it's good to drink, it's 0:07:53.280 --> 0:07:56.040 good in your veins, right, yeah, it was very much 0:07:56.040 --> 0:07:59.800 in that sane Wait wait wait, wait wait wait urine though, 0:08:00.160 --> 0:08:02.960 urine it's not good to drink. And is sheep's blood 0:08:03.000 --> 0:08:07.880 good to drink? It's good in sausages. Um. I'm not 0:08:07.920 --> 0:08:10.960 gonna I'm not going to argue either of those things. 0:08:10.960 --> 0:08:13.080 But what I am going to say is this is 0:08:13.160 --> 0:08:15.920 very closely related to that idea of blood letting being 0:08:16.040 --> 0:08:19.120 part of the medical procedures of the day. You know, 0:08:19.160 --> 0:08:22.680 the the idea of draining away things that were negative 0:08:22.840 --> 0:08:26.680 or or harmful to a person. Let yeah, yeah, and 0:08:26.800 --> 0:08:29.600 uh and so this was kind of a very primitive 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:33.240 approach obviously, and a lot of people who probably were 0:08:33.360 --> 0:08:36.160 not doing too well to begin with lost their lives 0:08:36.200 --> 0:08:39.120 as a part of the process of trying these things. 0:08:39.480 --> 0:08:43.160 In sixteen sixty seven, it was actually the first successful 0:08:43.200 --> 0:08:50.040 blood transfusion to human to human. Now, patients who would 0:08:50.080 --> 0:08:54.440 require multiple transfusions died usually during the process, and so 0:08:55.080 --> 0:08:58.920 while the first one first one's early ones were successful, 0:08:59.280 --> 0:09:03.560 it was a ttimately abandoned as a practice because it 0:09:03.559 --> 0:09:06.720 turned out that giving people multiple transfusions would end up 0:09:06.760 --> 0:09:09.199 killing them, so that they decided that it actually did 0:09:09.200 --> 0:09:12.200 not work. Uh yeah. I don't think that research really 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:15.679 picked back up again until about the eighteen hundreds. During 0:09:15.760 --> 0:09:20.439 the age of cholera. Yes, uh, physicians would treat people 0:09:20.440 --> 0:09:25.839 who were afflicted with asiatic cholera by injecting milk into them. 0:09:26.120 --> 0:09:27.840 The thought at the time was that the milk would 0:09:27.880 --> 0:09:33.160 help them regrow their white blood cells, which is not correct. However, 0:09:33.160 --> 0:09:39.680 it did, but milk is white, but milk thanks To 0:09:39.760 --> 0:09:43.760 be fair, some of the literature does suggest that perhaps 0:09:43.840 --> 0:09:47.959 it was actually helping some of the patients, but there 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:53.320 was not any real scientific inquiry as to what the 0:09:53.360 --> 0:09:56.840 mechanism was and it didn't get a wide enough acceptance, 0:09:56.840 --> 0:09:59.520 so it was pretty much abandoned as well. So whether 0:09:59.640 --> 0:10:03.320 or not it was actually effective in treating cholera is 0:10:03.880 --> 0:10:09.520 kind of up to debate. It was, Yeah, it's one 0:10:09.520 --> 0:10:12.880 of the things where without that scientific rigor, you can't 0:10:12.920 --> 0:10:16.360 say right. But other experiments using things like a saltwater 0:10:16.559 --> 0:10:19.200 saline as blood replacement seemed to be promising. There were 0:10:19.240 --> 0:10:22.080 some experiments with frogs that showed that if you were 0:10:22.080 --> 0:10:26.280 to replace a frog's blood with saline, it would continue living, 0:10:26.320 --> 0:10:29.719 which seemed really exciting until they saw that if you 0:10:29.840 --> 0:10:34.559 just remove a frog's blood entirely, it could continue living 0:10:34.640 --> 0:10:37.760 for a short while, which suggests that you could replace 0:10:37.800 --> 0:10:39.760 it with pretty much anything that's not going to be 0:10:39.880 --> 0:10:44.280 toxic and the frog would not happily, but but would 0:10:44.320 --> 0:10:47.200 continue to live for a little while. So then that 0:10:47.200 --> 0:10:52.360 that excitement about saline kind of died down. So um, 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:55.600 moving on, they started to look at using animal blood 0:10:55.920 --> 0:11:00.360 as replacement for for humans, but animal blood and have 0:11:00.600 --> 0:11:04.280 substances in it that are toxic to us, and at 0:11:04.280 --> 0:11:08.160 the time the physicians really didn't have the ability or 0:11:08.200 --> 0:11:11.439 the equipment to figure out which elements were going to 0:11:11.520 --> 0:11:14.280 be toxic how to remove them from the blood, so 0:11:14.360 --> 0:11:16.960 that it couldn't really make this an effective means of 0:11:17.000 --> 0:11:20.960 treating people without making them far more sick using something 0:11:20.960 --> 0:11:24.040 that would end up being toxic. Um and other experiments 0:11:24.120 --> 0:11:26.880 ended up leading to things called blood volume izers, which 0:11:26.880 --> 0:11:29.920 are not the same as a blood substitute. A volume 0:11:29.960 --> 0:11:32.720 isser is something that can mix with blood safely and 0:11:32.760 --> 0:11:35.400 not be toxic and can help if you have a 0:11:35.400 --> 0:11:39.040 condition that also has like low blood pressure. Let's say 0:11:39.040 --> 0:11:41.120 that you're being treated for something and you your blood 0:11:41.120 --> 0:11:44.400 pressure starts to drop. This would be able to bring 0:11:44.400 --> 0:11:47.160 your blood pressure back up, But the volume isser lacks 0:11:47.360 --> 0:11:50.840 any capability of handling any of the other functions of blood. 0:11:51.320 --> 0:11:56.520 So if you were you know, you could essentially asphyxiate 0:11:56.600 --> 0:11:58.640 to death. I mean, you would die from lack of 0:11:58.679 --> 0:12:01.360 oxygen you had too much of this in your system 0:12:01.600 --> 0:12:04.520 because it's not carrying it's not carrying the oxygen. But 0:12:05.120 --> 0:12:06.840 if it's just if it's one of those things where 0:12:06.880 --> 0:12:09.599 the blood pressure is a serious problem, and otherwise you 0:12:09.640 --> 0:12:12.559 would be you know, more or less Okay, through whatever procedure, 0:12:12.880 --> 0:12:17.640 it was a viable approach in small enough amounts, that 0:12:17.720 --> 0:12:21.040 kind of thing can be used until the patient's blood 0:12:21.040 --> 0:12:24.679 count gets back up. Yes, But uh, then some some 0:12:24.720 --> 0:12:27.280 important research happened in the late eighteen hundreds and early 0:12:27.360 --> 0:12:31.760 nineteen hundreds. That's when Leaphold land Steiner discovered blood types 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:34.880 which made human transfusions of blood a lot more safe, 0:12:35.440 --> 0:12:38.559 or or I mean they would make human transfusions of 0:12:38.559 --> 0:12:40.600 blood a lot more safe once we did a little 0:12:40.600 --> 0:12:43.600 bit more research into the chemistry of blood and the 0:12:43.640 --> 0:12:46.600 exact role of blood in doing all of this oxygen 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:49.520 circulation we've been talking about this. Obviously, no one knew 0:12:49.960 --> 0:12:53.480 that much about it until the early DS and and 0:12:53.520 --> 0:12:56.640 the World Wars really helped this research along because perhaps 0:12:56.640 --> 0:13:00.520 obviously people were very interested in how to helps save lives. 0:13:00.640 --> 0:13:03.319 Was absolutely a requirement at the time. Yeah, there's nothing 0:13:03.360 --> 0:13:06.880 like necessity to really push forward innovation, right, We've we've 0:13:06.920 --> 0:13:12.920 heard similar things over and over again, especially in this story. Um. Then, 0:13:12.960 --> 0:13:17.319 in the nineteen sixties, the first blood substitute was developed. 0:13:17.320 --> 0:13:20.199 It was called or it is called still today, per 0:13:20.240 --> 0:13:24.440 fluoro carbons or PFCs, and these are synthetic compounds that 0:13:24.520 --> 0:13:27.560 have this huge propensity for carrying gases that have been 0:13:27.640 --> 0:13:31.240 dissolved in a liquid and hence are useful for keeping 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:35.000 oxygen flowing through a patient's body and also helping to 0:13:35.040 --> 0:13:37.120 keep their blood pressure study. As we mentioned, a moment 0:13:37.120 --> 0:13:40.280 ago um, you know, usually until they can receive a 0:13:40.280 --> 0:13:44.000 transfusion or again grow back their own red blood cells. 0:13:44.080 --> 0:13:47.920 It's it's not a permanent blood substitute, right. I've heard 0:13:47.920 --> 0:13:51.439 that while it's capable of holding quite a bit of oxygen, 0:13:51.480 --> 0:13:54.680 it's not as efficient at transferring it as hemoglobin is. 0:13:54.960 --> 0:13:56.800 So it's it's one of those things that can be 0:13:56.880 --> 0:14:02.440 used to supplement, but not replace, uh someone's blood. Yes, 0:14:02.559 --> 0:14:05.559 I think. I think blood supplement is what I intended 0:14:05.559 --> 0:14:08.679 to say instead of blood substitute. But uh and and 0:14:08.679 --> 0:14:10.680 and this research at the time I don't think was 0:14:10.800 --> 0:14:13.280 quite in humans. Yet they were doing a bunch of 0:14:13.280 --> 0:14:17.880 research in mice and h Unfortunately for for the research 0:14:17.920 --> 0:14:20.360 at the time, the blood bank system that had been 0:14:20.520 --> 0:14:24.920 established thanks to the World Wars was working really well, 0:14:25.040 --> 0:14:28.680 and the risks in human trials were so steep that 0:14:28.720 --> 0:14:33.480 it was basically abandoned until the late nineteen seventies and 0:14:33.680 --> 0:14:37.400 early nineteen eighties when a Vietnam happened. Well, I mean, 0:14:37.600 --> 0:14:40.200 the country is always happening, I suppose, but when when 0:14:40.200 --> 0:14:44.280 when the when the Vietnam War happened? Yes, Um. Whereupon 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:46.560 a bunch of the blood bank system proved to be 0:14:46.640 --> 0:14:51.880 unstable for large scale disaster. And also it was discovered 0:14:51.920 --> 0:14:55.760 that viruses like hepatitis and the human immunoe deficiency virus 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:59.800 or HIV could be spread by blood transfusions. So that 0:15:00.240 --> 0:15:04.720 was a terrifying time for everyone. And PFCs were developed 0:15:04.720 --> 0:15:07.640 for human use and went onto the market. They've never 0:15:07.680 --> 0:15:11.520 actually been very popular or commercially viable, which in medical 0:15:11.520 --> 0:15:14.440 research is very important because, as we said in a 0:15:14.480 --> 0:15:16.920 recent episode, it's very expensive to bring stuff like this 0:15:17.000 --> 0:15:20.280 to the market, mostly because a whole lot of pfc 0:15:20.440 --> 0:15:22.720 s are acquired in order to really do any good 0:15:22.720 --> 0:15:25.200 in your system, like like you were saying, Jonathan, they don't. 0:15:25.320 --> 0:15:29.480 They're not extremely efficient at delivering oxygen um, and they 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:32.560 can cause a lot of adverse side effects after use, 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:35.960 especially in the vascular systems of the lungs and the brain, 0:15:36.320 --> 0:15:40.400 which people tend to want to keep using. Yeah. So Um. 0:15:40.520 --> 0:15:43.280 Then in in the nineteen nineties, as it was kind 0:15:43.320 --> 0:15:45.480 of being discovered that p f c s might not 0:15:45.560 --> 0:15:50.720 be the best stuff, a another class of substitute was developed, 0:15:50.760 --> 0:15:56.120 and that was hemoglobin based oxygen carriers or hbo c s. 0:15:56.480 --> 0:15:59.840 And these guys are are interesting because they're made from real, 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:04.600 actual sterilized hemoglobin, being of course, the compound that carries 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:08.360 the oxygen around in your blood. Um. And we get 0:16:08.360 --> 0:16:11.520 this hemoglobin from either human blood or cow blood, or 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:15.680 from bacteria that we have genetically modified in order to 0:16:15.760 --> 0:16:19.280 produce it, which I find fascinating. Um. But the thing 0:16:19.360 --> 0:16:22.040 is that you can't just stick hemoglobin in your blood 0:16:22.080 --> 0:16:25.040 stream and expect it to function. When it's in a 0:16:25.240 --> 0:16:27.400 red blood cell, it does its job really well, but 0:16:27.440 --> 0:16:30.080 when it's just kind of floating around, it breaks down 0:16:30.320 --> 0:16:35.920 very quickly into really quite toxic compounds. Yeah. So, so 0:16:36.400 --> 0:16:39.760 HBOCs have to contain the hemoglobin some way, and it's 0:16:39.800 --> 0:16:41.920 so much of a problem that none have ever been 0:16:42.160 --> 0:16:44.920 approved by the f d A. As far as I know, 0:16:44.960 --> 0:16:47.440 the only places that they've been licensed for for medical 0:16:47.560 --> 0:16:51.760 use are in South African hospitals which had a pretty 0:16:51.800 --> 0:16:54.680 huge AIDS crisis that put the blood supply at risk 0:16:54.960 --> 0:16:59.160 and also in Russia. However, there there's some recent research 0:16:59.720 --> 0:17:03.400 that is making it seem more and more viable as 0:17:03.440 --> 0:17:06.719 a solution. There's some people at the University of Essex 0:17:06.720 --> 0:17:11.520 are engineering hemoglobin molecules combined with the amino acid tyro scene, 0:17:11.960 --> 0:17:14.919 which they say can enable a patient's body to break 0:17:15.280 --> 0:17:18.640 the stuff down more safely. Uh. And they just received 0:17:18.640 --> 0:17:21.399 some like one point five million pounds in funding that 0:17:21.840 --> 0:17:25.280 heavy to pursue it. So I see what you did there. 0:17:25.560 --> 0:17:28.920 Thank you. Pounds the currency, the pounds of currency, pounds 0:17:28.920 --> 0:17:32.960 of hema globin. Man, you are so good at saying hemoglobin. 0:17:33.040 --> 0:17:35.640 I keep wanting to say hemo goblin, which is one 0:17:35.640 --> 0:17:39.720 of the most terrifying creatures in the Dungeons and Dragons University. 0:17:40.040 --> 0:17:42.480 And when you actually managed to hit that critical blow, 0:17:42.520 --> 0:17:47.840 they just explode in blood. That's gross. Uh Okay, So 0:17:48.080 --> 0:17:52.840 backing away from exploding blood monsters, what's really cool about 0:17:52.880 --> 0:17:56.000 all of all of these these potential blood substitutes is 0:17:56.080 --> 0:17:59.080 that their shelf stable for like up to two years, 0:17:59.520 --> 0:18:04.000 which is a big improvement over carrying around jars of 0:18:04.080 --> 0:18:06.360 human blood, which you you have, well, I mean it's 0:18:06.359 --> 0:18:08.080 probably not in jars, but but you have to keep 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:11.879 refrigerated otherwise it will go very bad, very quickly um 0:18:12.000 --> 0:18:15.760 and be useless. And furthermore, they are not dependent on 0:18:15.840 --> 0:18:18.560 blood type, so you can just keep them out in 0:18:18.600 --> 0:18:22.560 the field where where we need them in case of emergency. 0:18:23.840 --> 0:18:26.240 But the thing is that, you know, unlike this Bruce 0:18:26.280 --> 0:18:29.760 Campbell movie we're talking about, or like true blood, it's 0:18:29.760 --> 0:18:33.679 not really blood. But that's okay, because, I mean, because 0:18:33.680 --> 0:18:37.560 the entire idea of anyone drinking blood is completely crazy, 0:18:37.680 --> 0:18:41.120 right I would imagine, So, I mean, I can't there's 0:18:41.119 --> 0:18:45.840 no scientific basis for consuming blood or anything like that, 0:18:46.040 --> 0:18:50.040 right WHOA, Joe, I knew there was a reason we 0:18:50.080 --> 0:18:54.120 brought you along, maybe not drinking blood. Well that that's 0:18:54.200 --> 0:18:57.040 somewhat of a relief. But there have been some really 0:18:57.119 --> 0:19:01.520 interesting scientific findings, especially in the past few years, that 0:19:01.600 --> 0:19:07.719 proved that young blood is delicious and will make you immortal. Well, 0:19:07.760 --> 0:19:09.959 I know that companies are always looking for young blood 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:13.040 to keep things going, but I think that's kind of metaphoric. No, 0:19:13.160 --> 0:19:19.159 the liquid the healthy individual tell me more. Joe. Well, okay, 0:19:19.160 --> 0:19:21.760 so I was overstating. It won't actually make you immortal 0:19:21.800 --> 0:19:24.760 as far as we know, And I totally take back 0:19:24.760 --> 0:19:28.359 the delicious part. I'm sure that it's disgusting. I bet 0:19:28.520 --> 0:19:32.240 I don't know. Joe has never drank human blood. That's 0:19:32.240 --> 0:19:36.600 what I'm saying. Anyway, let's let's move on. Um No, seriously, 0:19:36.640 --> 0:19:40.240 here are the facts. So, multiple experiments have shown that 0:19:40.400 --> 0:19:46.200 in mice, young blood has measurable rejuvenating effects. So wait, 0:19:46.280 --> 0:19:49.760 you mean like you get like a mouse that's you know, 0:19:49.800 --> 0:19:52.560 a geriatric mouse, and you give it a transfusion of 0:19:52.640 --> 0:19:56.240 young mouse blood and things change for the old mouse. 0:19:56.359 --> 0:19:59.280 That is exactly what I'm seeing. You can take young 0:19:59.440 --> 0:20:02.240 blood from a young mouse, give it to an older mouse, 0:20:02.240 --> 0:20:08.320 and you see broad, widespread and significant health benefits. On 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:12.040 one hand, this sounds totally crazy and Frankensteiny right, like, 0:20:12.280 --> 0:20:14.600 you know, the premise of a poorly research sci fi 0:20:14.680 --> 0:20:16.920 movie is just part of what's creepy about it is 0:20:16.960 --> 0:20:20.159 how simple it is, Right, you just take the young blood, 0:20:20.240 --> 0:20:24.000 put it in the old animal health benefits sounds fake, 0:20:24.320 --> 0:20:28.120 it's absolutely true and it kind of makes sense. So 0:20:28.760 --> 0:20:31.080 when we age, part of what's happening to us is 0:20:31.119 --> 0:20:34.480 that there's a marked decline in our body tissues ability 0:20:34.520 --> 0:20:37.800 to regenerate itself. Right, it becomes harder for us to 0:20:37.920 --> 0:20:41.720 make the new cells we need to stay young. So 0:20:42.240 --> 0:20:44.720 if you just think about this in trivial terms, it's 0:20:44.720 --> 0:20:47.879 totally normal when a young child gets an injury, you know, 0:20:47.960 --> 0:20:50.480 it has a skateboarding accident, gets all scuffed up and 0:20:50.520 --> 0:20:53.639 stuff that heals pretty quick. If you think about an 0:20:53.680 --> 0:20:57.359 adult getting a comparable injury, suddenly that thing that's no 0:20:57.480 --> 0:20:59.520 big deal on a kid is a big deal on 0:20:59.560 --> 0:21:02.360 an adult. It takes a lot longer to heal. It's 0:21:02.400 --> 0:21:07.000 just generally more debilitating. Oh man, this is a problem, 0:21:07.080 --> 0:21:09.960 and so that we suspect that over time, aging does 0:21:10.000 --> 0:21:12.720 something to the functioning of stem cells in our body 0:21:13.000 --> 0:21:15.600 that are responsible for growing new tissue. But the question 0:21:15.720 --> 0:21:19.480 is exactly what's happening and is there any way to 0:21:19.520 --> 0:21:23.000 reverse it? Uh So, there was actually a really great 0:21:23.080 --> 0:21:25.159 article about this that came out in New Scientists just 0:21:25.200 --> 0:21:27.960 a couple of days ago on August twenty and a 0:21:28.000 --> 0:21:30.280 lot of what I'm siting here I learned about through that. 0:21:31.000 --> 0:21:38.240 So there's this process called hetero chronic parabiosis. I recognize 0:21:38.280 --> 0:21:41.480 some of those syllables, but what is that exactly? Para? 0:21:41.640 --> 0:21:45.880 I hope I'm pronouncing this right, it's either parabiosis or parabiosis. 0:21:45.920 --> 0:21:48.280 I don't know. That's one of those tough words we 0:21:48.359 --> 0:21:52.000 forgive you, sorry. Parabioses p A r A b io 0:21:52.640 --> 0:21:57.040 s I S. Parabiosis in this case refers to removing 0:21:57.240 --> 0:22:01.680 skin patches from two mice and sowing the mice together, 0:22:02.000 --> 0:22:05.520 so you end up with a mega mouse like vultron 0:22:05.560 --> 0:22:08.959 of mice. You you end up connecting their circulatory system. 0:22:09.080 --> 0:22:11.960 So in this way the two mice share a bloodstream. 0:22:12.280 --> 0:22:15.760 Their blood becomes one common pool. Not not literally it's 0:22:15.760 --> 0:22:18.440 actually still inside the mice, right, but it connects and 0:22:18.440 --> 0:22:22.160 and these are these will be referred to as parabiotic mice. So. 0:22:22.320 --> 0:22:25.440 The process was first described by a French physiologist named 0:22:25.440 --> 0:22:28.239 Paul Bert b E. R. T. I guess it's not 0:22:28.280 --> 0:22:33.040 just Burt Paul Bart in the eighteen sixties, and then 0:22:33.119 --> 0:22:36.320 later in the nineteen thirties the process was improved upon 0:22:36.480 --> 0:22:40.159 by Bunster and Meer, and basically as it is today. 0:22:40.160 --> 0:22:44.240 It entails attaching the two mice at parallel elbows and knees, 0:22:44.480 --> 0:22:48.119 side by side, and then sewing together an exposed patch 0:22:48.160 --> 0:22:51.000 along their sides, and after some length of time, the 0:22:51.000 --> 0:22:54.639 pair can safely be separated again if necessary for the experiment. 0:22:56.280 --> 0:22:57.959 I want to put it in that this is fascinating 0:22:58.000 --> 0:23:01.120 but terrifying. Yeah, yeah, it's as I said, it's starting 0:23:01.119 --> 0:23:05.480 to sound like something from Animal Moderately Frankensteiny. Yeah. So, 0:23:05.520 --> 0:23:08.200 as you might guess from the name, So that's parabiasis. 0:23:08.760 --> 0:23:13.040 As you might guess from the name, hetero chronic parabiasis 0:23:13.359 --> 0:23:17.040 would mean mixed time scales, hetero chronic mixed time. So 0:23:17.080 --> 0:23:21.119 you're creating a union of parabiotic mice where one mouse 0:23:21.280 --> 0:23:25.280 is old and the other mouse is young. So what's 0:23:25.320 --> 0:23:29.320 really striking about hetero chronic parabiasies in mice is that 0:23:29.359 --> 0:23:33.080 the old mouse seems to benefit greatly from the blood 0:23:33.240 --> 0:23:36.720 of the young. Unfortunately, the young mice ended up getting 0:23:36.720 --> 0:23:39.280 no benefit at all. And we're obsessed with murders. She 0:23:39.320 --> 0:23:44.240 wrote you a just hey, I'm sorry. I'm just saying. 0:23:44.720 --> 0:23:47.040 I guess you are the oldest person here. You can 0:23:47.119 --> 0:23:51.360 make those jokes. It's okay for him. In the nineteen fifties, 0:23:51.560 --> 0:23:56.560 researcher at Cornell named Clive McKay performed experiments with parabiasis 0:23:56.560 --> 0:23:59.720 and a quest to learn about prolonging the lifespan of mammals. 0:24:00.160 --> 0:24:03.639