A few years ago,
DARPA teamed up with a company called Arteriocyte to research methods for manufacturing blood without an actual donor on-hand, and whaddya know -- a million and change tax dollars later, here we are. You no doubt remember
stem cells. Well, they're back in a major way (did they really ever leave?), and this time instead of clogging up the Supreme Court's backlog they're helping manufacture
blood that is "functionally indistinguishable" from the real type-O. "Pharmed" blood (their word, not ours) will eventually be a godsend for troops in the field, where fresh blood often takes three weeks to arrive from the source. But don't cancel all your donor appointments just yet -- eBlood (our word, not theirs) won't be ready for human testing until 2013. And pints still cost more than a bottle of Johnny Walker's finest -- around $5,000, and that's before they factor in the cookies and apple juice they gave the umbilical cord for its time and patience.
posted July 14th 2010 11:09AM
Bloody ace
@Pavelz
Article title WIN!!!
@Pavelz Yum, TruBlood.
Soookie!
@Pavelz
Well, this explain why some people don't have drop call using the iphone 4.
Why does blood cost $5000 a pint if the blood donors only get cookies for it?
yes! the vampires can finally come out of hiding
this would make a great movie...
@Wikimon
except that...
@Wikimon
Well... right now it's on TV. Ever watched "True Blood"?
@SeeKo
it's a book too, coincidentally.
@SeeKo - Only once and never again.
@Brokinarrow
eh some of the chicks on that show were quite hot
but the story really drags cause everyone is SO stupid. painfully stupid
@elduderino that's not a coincidence.
@Wikimon
Well, it is set in the south.
@Colin S
Now see... That's the reason I don't care for movies based in the south. I've lived different parts of Louisiana my whole life. The way Hollywood portrays the south is actually not true. They take the old south and mix in heavy accents to make movies.
Sighs.... The Water Boy was a good movie though.
Anyway, at least now my wife won't mess with me about being afraid to give blood :)
Very good news...if they can create blood, can they make it so it isn't able to carry infectious disease/virus?
Its time for a new era in realistic movie blood!
True Blood??!
So I am guessing that in a few years the vampires in hiding will be coming out ala True Blood?
Interesting though how Vampires have become so popular and accepted and now this is coming out.... makes a good conspiracy theory.
eh forget I said that...need food, blood sugar is low.
Ha... blood sugar..!
gotta go!
@technojeff YOUR A VAMPIRE!!!!!! caught RED HANDED....hehe
@dagetz Heh, would love to be a vampire if the price was right.
Im already up half the night, drink lots of liquids, am very pale, and dont own much silver. super strong and fast and flying are just gravy!
True Blood??!
So I am guessing that in a few years the vampires in hiding will be coming out ala True Blood?
Interesting though how Vampires have become so popular and accepted and now this is coming out.... makes a good conspiracy theory.
eh forget I said that...need food, blood sugar is low.
Ha... blood sugar..!
gotta go!
This just can't end well...
That Carlile dude is already loaded anyways
@10nisman94
Did you mean Carlisle?
Note to world: Stop making strides in innovation that are needed to save lives on the cheap, and then charge 5000$ for a piece of it.
WTF?
@Jordus $5000 today, $5 tomorrow. You've got to start somewhere.
For the military $5000/pint is probably an acceptable price. Let them use it and bring down the technology price, and then it will filter down to everyone else.
Be interesting to know the actual cost/pint of donated blood (by the time you've paid for nurses to take it, keeping it, blood donor centres, advertising, etc, etc)
@Jordus I know $5000 bucks? I thought innovation was a relatively cheap endevour. *Extreme Sarcasm*
Also, developed for the US military to save soldiers, not lives...
@StereoTypo wow....so soldiers arent "lives"?
You ignorant jackass.
@StereoTypo $5000 is cheap for the military so I'm not sure about your sarcasm. How much do you think it costs to get a person from home country, trained, paid, equipped to the battlefield? At this price I reckon they'll be very interested. Plus it's good PR and the benefits of the trickle down are obvious to the whole of society.
@Jordus
I think his argument was that they're saving the soldiers so that they can go out and kill more people. I'm not saying I agree with him, but that's his argument.
@Jordus
Especially since taxpayers dollars were used in developing the stuff.
I wouldn't be opposed to the government charging that much, so DARPA could continue funding more projects, but I think it is a bad economic model for the government to pay to develop this stuff then let someone else make all the profits. (I know the government gets some back in corporate tax & income tax, but I'm not sure it is enough to cover it all.)
@Jordus $5000 in imaginary military money is like $50 to you and I. For the money they spent on my uncle's ruggedized laptop and phone he could have been chauffeured around Baghdad in a Bentley.
@rcappo DARPA is the goverment... Defense Advanced Reasearch Projects Agency... http://www.darpa.mil/
@cashclientel According to this article, http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/orl-asecblood-bank-probe-071609071609jul16,0,6099403.story, a pint of blood was going for $310 a pint last summer. 5k for the first batch of fake stuff is not so bad as later mass production will result in drastically lower prices.
The hard part for me is figuring out where I will be able to get free popcorn, cookies, apples, and juice when they stop needing blood banks.
@jkharri Holy shit, and people are giving it away for juice and cookies? I'm gonna start taking a pint of blood every other day and sell it to a hospital or something. Maybe this could get hobos off the street, or me a new set of golf clubs!
@Robo
correction, $5000 is more like $0.50 to us. If you calculate the wars costing over one trillion, 5 grand is just pennies.
@engadgetcomexcludeengadget
This isn't price; It's cost.
That's go to save lives in future.
True Blood is going to become a reality...
Damn you for putting a Twilight reference in that headline, Engadget.
Damn me for knowing that it was a Twilight reference.
@TheBennettBrigade
Thank you for pointing out it is a twilight reference so I don't have to waste my time researc...googling it.
@TheBennettBrigade
You're not alone.
I'm now one step closer to creating my Terminator...
@nanascho
That is what I thought as well.
eBlood ? Electronic Blood ?
Surely you mean mBlood, Manufactured Blood.
@fourthletter
I'm sure that they originally considered writing iBlood, for we all know what they constantly have on the brain, but they changed their minds in fear of a flame-war.
Unfortunately, they have little experience dealing with beginnings that do not involve an " i ", so they dished out an " e ", uncertain of its true meaning.
I do agree with you, fourthletter, mBlood is a superior name.
Awesome. So someone explain to me how stem cell research is not awesome? How can anyone be against techno blood?
How could the vampires in Daybreakers did not figure this out? jeezeeeee
From the Article:
"Using this process the cells from one umbilical cord can produce about 20 units of blood, which is enough for over three transfusions for injured soldiers in the field."
Sorry guys, no magical/infinitely sustainable manufactured blood donor source here. Donors are still required.
@dallasmay Little under 500K babies are born every day... I don't think they really need the cords anymore...
Am I the only one who finds this engadget article to be hilariously written.
"Well, they're back in a major way (did they really ever leave?)" cracked me up.