Ever stop to think of the river of plasma and blood cells flowing through your body every moment of the day? Well, scientists, medical researchers, and artists all across the world are doing more than just thinking about it, they’re rewriting the future with it…yeah, blood!
1Young blood may extend life
A new study by scientists at Stanford University suggests blood taken from young mice and injected into older mice boosts the brain functions of the older mice.
In the study, 18-month-old mice were injected with the blood plasma of three-month-old mice. “The injected mice performed better on memory tests than mice of the same age that had not been given blood plasma,” said one scientist.
Is this setting up a scenario whereby transhumanists seeking immortality actually become vampires? Probably not, but I’ve been wanting to ask that rhetorical question for years!
2Your computer will bleed
That’s right, electronic blood for bionic computers…sounds almost like a political platform in the year 2042.
According to IBM: “The key to making supermachines 10,000 times more efficient is to build bionic computers cooled and powered by electronic blood.”
This is precisely what they’re doing with their prototype system called Aquasar, which uses tubes to deliver liquid coolant to computer circuits.
Though decades from implementation, “electronic blood” could help lessen the danger of supercomputers becoming too powerful for humans to power!
3You can become physically addicted to blood consumption
Likely as the result of childhood abuse and more recent tragedies including witnessing the death of his child and the beheading of a friend, a man from Turkey developed multiple personalities, dissociative identity disorder (DID), post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), chronic depression and alcohol abuse
According to doctors at the Denizli Military Hospital in southwestern Turkey, we can add vampirism to that list as well.
They said drinking blood became “as urgent as breathing” for the man. The man, whose name and hometown were not revealed in the report, was arrested several times after stabbing and biting others to collect and drink their blood. He apparently even got his father to get him bags of the ghastly drink from blood banks.
To their knowledge, the man is the first patient with “vampirism” and DID. In a follow-up six weeks after he was treated, the doctors said the man’s blood-drinking behavior was in remission, but his dissociative symptoms persisted.
4Zombie dog experiment could save future people
In 1940 Russian scientists tried to reanimate dead dogs by creating an artificial blood circulation system.
In 2005 American scientists tried again by “flushing all the blood from [the dogs’] bodies and replacing it with oxygen and sugar-filled saline,” according to the researchers from the Safar Center for Resuscitation Research at the University of Pittsburgh. A blood transfusion and an electric shock later and the dogs were back from the dead. Supposedly.
Why, you ask? The word is this kind of treatment could one day save people from hemorrhaging blood too quickly.
5Blood makes an excellent pigment for painting
Artist Vinicius%20Quesada uses a combination of blood and urine to express his artistic vision. He’s not the only painter who has discovered the powerful pigmentation supplied by the human body. Castiglia extracts his blood in his studio and then uses it to paint. He calls it “liquid flesh.”
6Rejuvenate your skin with a blood facial
Forget Botox, the newest rage in anti-aging facial cosmetics is code-named the “Vampire Facelift.”
The procedure requires about two to four vials of blood. Doctors separate the platelets and protein, and then re-inject it into the face to build more collagen.
Bloody Face from American Horror Story anyone?
7Fertilize your garden with blood
Blood meal in your soil can supplement nitrogen, which is needed for chlorophyll and promotes healthy root systems and resistance to diseases.
So, scoop up the pools of blood from the slaughterhouse floor and put it in spray bottles – or, since we don’t actually live in a demented horror movie (yet), your plants could go vegetarian.
8Secret government database of newborn blood
According to the ACLU: “The DNA of virtually every newborn in the United States is collected, usually via a blood sample taken from a prick to the baby’s heel, and tested for certain genetic and other disorders.”
Between 2003 and 2007, 800 samples from Texas newborns were stored without their parents’ consent or knowledge.
Without informed consent — that is, telling parents how long the sample will be stored and if and how their baby’s blood samples will be used in the future, and then the parents agreeing — abuses will inevitably follow.
9Batteries that run on blood
A small piece of paper, powered by sweat and blood. It’s a bio-battery. When implanted under the skin it can charge things like LEDs. Maybe someday we’ll see cardiovascular bio-batteries that charge entire households.
10Tiny robots will repair your blood cells
Like the robot remake of Fantastic Voyage, nanobots in the near future could journey into our bloodstream and help clean up our blood cells.
Incredibly, the process involves “collecting the membrane from a red blood cell and wrapping it like a powerful camouflaging cloak around a biodegradable polymer nanoparticle stuffed with a cocktail of small molecule drugs.”