Biochemical Changes on Storage of Blood

Abstract. The rate of reduction of ferrihemoglobin within the erythrocytes and the oxygen affinity of red cells have been measured as a function of time of blood storage. The efficiency of the ferrihemoglobin-reducing systems decreases with time of storage as measured both in presence of glucose or lactate as substrates. The well-known increase with ageing of the oxygen affinity (as measured by p1/2) for blood stored in ACD is observed when the p1/2 is determined in Tris-HCl buffer and parallels the decay of the rate of ferrihemoglobin reduction. However, the increase in oxygen affinity is not observed when the p1/2 is measured in phosphate buffer; this is explained as being due to the replacement of the originally hemoglobin-bound DPG by phosphate ions entering the red cell.