Oxygen-carrying Substitutes
An oxygen-carrying blood substitute, sometimes called artificial haemoglobin, is an artificially made red blood cell substitute whose main function is to carry oxygen, as does natural haemoglobin. The use of oxygen-carrying blood substitutes is often called oxygen therapeutics to differentiate from true blood substitutes. The initial goal of oxygen carrying blood substitutes is merely to mimic blood's oxygen transport capacity. There is additional longer range research on true artificial red and white blood cells which could theoretically compose a blood substitute with higher fidelity to human blood. Unfortunately, oxygen transport, one function that distinguishes real blood from other volume expanders, has been very difficult to reproduce.
There are two basic approaches to constructing an oxygen therapeutic. The first is perfluorocarbons (PFC), chemical compounds which can carry and release oxygen. The specific PFC usually used is perfluorodecalin. The second is haemoglobin derived from humans, animals, or artificially via recombinant technology.
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“Unless the reformer can invent something which substitutes attractive virtues for attractive vices, he will fail.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)