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Contrary to the title, the blood isn't used as a vaccine ingredient. It's used to test the vaccines for bacterial toxins.

• mateo1 5y ago
  You'd think they'd use some kind of chromatography to test each batch, right? And also test the reactors for contamination, after all bacterial toxins require bacteria. Don't they do this sort of QC?
  • salawat 5y ago
    Doesn't work that way with organic chem as I understand it. You'd just see spectral lines for carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen and whatever else atomwise is in the toxin, but it isn't those atoms themselves that make it toxic, it's their arrangement in reference to each other. You need the right enzyme to produce a chemical reaction to measure to get an affirmative result; an enzyme being a molecular structure optimized to lower the activation energy of a particular chemical reaction by making the ideal physical conditions for it to take place. Chromatography requires either stratifying the mixture in a fluid, or vaporizing it, which kinda defeats the purpose. Yet more evidence Organic chemistry is God's way of saying he hates Chemists.
    • mateo1 5y ago
      Well there is gel chromatography, electrophoresis, light based techniques etc, but I don't know how well they fare for molecules of this size, sensitivity and relative concentrations.