An Alternative to Blood Donations: Lab-Grown Blood Stocks

by Monica Joshi

The desperate cry for donations of life-saving, clean blood has won the hearts of an increasing number of people over the past few years. And yet, the higher number of donations is simply not meeting the demand. Scientists are now trying to find an alternative to the blood donations, so that we do not have to rely on the altruism of a handful of qualified donors.

There is a possibility that they could use synthetic blood substitutes, which could work very well by being given to any patient in need, regardless of their blood type. However, a less artificial approach could be to grow stocks of human blood cells in the lab. We should also be able to find out whether this works in just a few years (ideally, 2017), as the first clinical trial investigating their potential has recently been put in motion.

The U.K. National Health Service (NHS) announced that the trial will take place by 2017 and will involve transfusing tiny amounts of lab-grown blood into one group of volunteers. They will also be providing another group with donated blood for comparison purposes.

Scientists hope that this will help them understand the survivability of the cells in the recipients and whether there are any adverse effects that they should be aware of. They're hopeful that the technique will work, based on research from a few years ago. A previous study demonstrated that such cells are capable of behaving like the real thing in human subjects.

The precise technique that the NHS scientists will use to grow these cells is unclear at this stage. It has been reported that they intend to start off with stem cells taken from the bone marrow of adult donors. They would then encourage them to turn into red blood cells, by using a cocktail of growth-stimulating chemicals.

According to Nick Watkins, NHS Blood and Transplant assistant director of research and development:

“The intention is not to replace blood donation, but to provide specialist treatment for specific patient groups.”

If this is successful, they then plan on investigating another possible method, which would use the same starting cells, namely hematopoietic stem cells. They plan on instead sourcing these blood cells from donated umbilical cords.

Earlier works have shown that both of these methods have worked in the lab; however, the challenge — and possibly the most time-consuming one — is that they can't make more than a few teaspoons' worth. That simply isn't enough for a transfusion.

Nonetheless, this research is extremely valuable, as it could help to treat individuals with certain blood conditions, such as sickle-cell anemia. It could also be interesting to use this blood to study the particular structure of blood-related illnesses.