Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Blood feud: The debate over how long blood lasts

Nature Medicine volume 20, pages 979–981 (2014)Cite this article

Subjects

This article has been updated

“There's no question that old blood is really abnormal,” says Mark Gladwin, a vascular medicine specialist at the University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. What's debatable, he says, is whether red blood cells expire sooner than we think.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Change history

  • 22 September 2014

     In the September 2014 issue, the piece “Blood feud: The debate over how long blood lasts” (Nat. Med. 20, 979–982, 2014) stated that proteins in stored blood “can scavenge nitrous oxide” and that “nitrous oxide might tighten blood vessels.” However, the story should have referred to nitric oxide, not nitrous oxide. The error has been corrected in the HTML and PDF versions of this article.

References

  1. Koch, C. et al. New Engl. J. Med., 358. 1229–1239 (2008).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  2. Edgren, G. et al. Transfusion 50, 1185–1195 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Tarasev, M. et al. Transfusion 54, 933–941, (2014).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Koch, C.G. et al. Ann. Thorac. Surg. 82, 13–20 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Koch, C.G. et al. Ann. Thorac. Surg. 81, 1650–1657 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Koch, C.G. et al. Crit. Care. Med. 34, 1608–1616 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Jeanne Erdmann is a health and science writer in Wentzville, Missouri.,

    Jeanne Erdmann

Authors
  1. Jeanne Erdmann
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Erdmann, J. Blood feud: The debate over how long blood lasts. Nat Med 20, 979–981 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/nm0914-979

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nm0914-979

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing