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Animals whose blood isn't red (2021)
- ortusdux 3y agoThere is a condition called Sulfhemoglobinemia wherein you blood takes up sulfur instead of iron and your blood turns green.
- temp0826 3y agoWikipedia says vulcans have green blood due to copper-based hemocyanin. Seems logical.
- gilleain 3y agoInteresting - a minor point, but the sulfur does not seem to replace the iron, but is just an -SH group on the haem.
- kulahan 3y agoWow, that's an extremely green blood if Google's images are to be believed
- markx2 3y agoMinor yet important typo. "Crocodile icefish frequent brutally cold portions of the sea where the water temperature can plummet all the way down to 28.5 degrees Fahrenheit (1.9 degrees Celsius). That's below the point at which fresh water freezes." 28.5F is minus -1.94C
- croisillon 3y agowould be great if there was an easy mnemotechnics to remember at how many degrees Celsius fresh water freezes
- analog31 3y agoIt's easy to remember, exactly 100 degrees below the boiling point.
- KMag 3y agoI doubt there's any simple way to remember that non-linear pressure vs. freezing point function for water.
- wolverine876 3y ago> 28.5F is minus -1.94C Myself, I don't throw stones.
- crazygringo 3y ago...and yet not a single picture of the blood of any of them.
- medstrom 3y agoRight?! That'd be the first thing on my agenda if I wanted to write an article with that title. I'll choose to believe the writers didn't especially have an interest, they were just paid to write.
- dvh 3y agoIf the news article contains "... caught on video" there's like 50% chance there will be video in that news article.
- moritzwarhier 3y agoI didn't read the article, but the infinite scrolling experience, extremely long text and overall site appearance makes me question if this was written by a "journalist" or "author" at all. I might be wrong, sad then, but this page looks SEO 1x1, AI or not. Manages to quiet down my interest sparked by the headline quite well.
- huytersd 3y agoThe text seems fine. If it was written by an AI, it’s a very good one. I find it sad that a name as big as “how stuff works” has to resort to cramming their pages full of ads because there is no other realistic way to make money.
- james_pm 3y agoIs this why blood has a metallic taste? It's literally metallic?
- s0rce 3y agoI'm pretty sure, yes.
- at_a_remove 3y agoI've never bought the official explanation for this. We have just four iron atoms per hemoglobin. But the roughly quarter-billion of these per red blood cell are in the red blood cells, which presumably haven't all suddenly lysed and dumped their hemoglobin. I think we should test with blood plasma first. I'm thinking it is the various salts in the plasma we're tasting, not the iron bound up in hemoglobin which is itself trapped inside of red blood cells.
- r2_pilot 3y agoI was going to say, it's always been a more copper-y taste to me and that's what I usually read in descriptions of the taste.
- s0rce 3y agoDid some more reading, can't find much conclusive, you might be right, this reddit post is probably one of the better discussions https://www.reddit.com/r/biology/comments/cqes9/why_does_blood_taste_metallic/ https://www.reddit.com/r/biology/comments/cqes9/why_does_blo...
- jihadjihad 3y agoSurprised there is no mention of lobsters, who, like crocodile icefish have colorless blood. For lobsters it appears blue once it comes in contact with oxygen [0]. 0: https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/outreach-and-education/fun-facts-about-luscious-lobsters https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/outreach-and-educati...
- gilleain 3y agoAlso they miss mentioning https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erythrocruorin https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erythrocruorin which is green, but for a different reason than biliverdin in lizards. Seems it has chlorocruorin in which looks very much like a 'normal' haem (i can't spot the difference off hand). edit: Ok, from Figure 2 here : https://biomolecules101.wordpress.com/2020/01/17/oxygen-transport-proteins-the-colors-of-blood/ https://biomolecules101.wordpress.com/2020/01/17/oxygen-tran... looks like normal heme ('heme b') has an ethenyl group while chlorocruorin has an aldehyde there
- whearyou 3y agoHow could they leave off Vulcans? Gross oversight
- kulahan 3y agoAlong a similar line, look into animals that don't sweat clear! Hippos sweat red, so they look like they're just covered in blood sometimes. Horses sweat white, so they look like they're just... well, you can go see for yourself.
- _a_a_a_ 3y agoI'm surprised hemocyanin isn't poisonous to us, or at least bad. Ingesting copper just doesn't sound healthy. AFAIC it isn't something we usually do either, so no pressure to evolve a way to metabolise it either.
- dekhn 3y agoWe eat about 1mg of copper a day. It's an essential trace mineral. You can consume 10mg safely per day.
- _a_a_a_ 3y agoHuh. Didn't know. Thanks!
- dredmorbius 3y agoThe term "essential minerals" refers to minerals (elemental rather than organic chemical compounds) required for life. For humans, those include five major minerals: calcium, phosphorus, potassium, sodium, and magnesium, and an additional nine "trace elements": iron, chlorine, cobalt, copper, zinc, manganese, molybdenum, iodine, and selenium. (From Wikipedia: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mineral_(nutrient) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mineral_(nutrient)>) Dose is critical. Whilst too little causes deficiency syndromes, too much of these compounds may also be harmful. Note that even excessive water consumption can be deadly.
- eh_why_not 3y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood#Color https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood#Color, straightforward and useful.
- bloomingeek 3y agoThe next time someone insults me, I gonna respond: "Listen here, you green-blooded Skink!"
- Tommstein 3y agoThis website manages to both hijack the back button and not show a single picture of any of the blood that the entire article is about. Fuck this website.
- iancmceachern 3y agoThe horseshoe crab blood thing is always so interesting to me every time it comes up. Our society really has some very weak points.