Blood substitutes

Blood substitutes have long been sought after, and artificial oxygen carriers may soon become a reality. Despite increased safety of allogeneic blood in terms of transmission of infectious diseases [1], avoiding allogeneic blood transfusions remains an important goal in perioperative and intensive care medicine. This is because allogeneic blood transfusions may cause immunosuppression with an increased incidence of postoperative infections [2,3] and may adversely affect outcome in intensive care [4], and thus they remain a public concern [5].