Scientists in Kazakhstan say they’ve developed an easy and eco-friendly method of producing blood substitute from petroleum products, Tengrinews reports.
Scientists in Kazakhstan say they’ve developed an easy and eco-friendly method of producing blood substitute from petroleum products, Tengrinews reports.
Professor at the Department of Chemistry of the al-Farabi University Dmitry Korulkin said that Kazakh doctors were using artificial blood, but they had to buy it from abroad, primarily from China.
He noted there were several methods of producing artificial blood from petroleum products. However, Korulkin maintained that the Kazakh technology differed significantly - it was more simple and eco-friendly.
A significant disadvantage of the foreign blood substitutes, according to Korulkin, is the presence of harmful, toxic impurities, which in some cases may lead to severe poisonings and even fatal outcome.
The so-called "blue blood" is used in emergency medicine. It is administered to people who have had severe blood loss due to trauma or surgery. Artificial blood is not an adequate substitute but it gives additional time to finding donors.
Korulkin said that artificial blood can be obtained from materials produced at Kazakhstan’s oil refineries. Its production will not be expensive, since it can be done in the existing laboratories. This means that the cost of the domestic product will be 3-4 times lower than that of the foreign-made.
Reporting by Dmitry Khegai, writing by Dinara Urazova