Could a Worm Save Your Life?

In today’s article we will talk about a very particular case

The Arenicola Marina (aka the Blood Worm)

The Arenicola marina or more commonly called lugworm or sandworm is a sea worm that are present on the beaches of Bretagne (France), Great Britain and North America (although it is a different species, smaller). They are nowadays studied by scientists and more specially by a biotechnology company called Hemarina for being, possibly, a blood substitute.

Franck Zal, founder of Hemarina, is a French marine biologist native from the Brittany coast. He started to study the lugworm in order to know how it breath. To do so, he analyzed the way of how the oxygen was running into the lugworm’s blood and by a fortunate chance he discovered that the blood did not contain any red cells (meaning that the blood is universal). Afterwards, the discovery was presented in front of a bunch of doctors who realized the importance of the discovery and how it could revolutionize medicine. Franck Zal realized that he can help saving lives by creating blood supply from lugworm blood. Everybody knows that the supply of blood is very low. Then, In 2007, Franck Zal created his biotechnology company.

Franck Zal, during a TEDx conference in Paris, talked about three potential reasons for the use of the Arenicola marina’s blood:

1. 
   

           The possibility of keeping the lugworm blood for a very long term 

           by transforming it into freeze-dried blood and use it when needed 

           (in a natural catastrophe for instance). Indeed, the human blood 

           once out of the human system can be kept only up to 42 days and 

           at 4 degrees. 

   
   

   2.     The blood will allow wounds healing specially towards diabetic 

           people as the flow of oxygen on lugworm’s blood is fifty times bigger.

   
   

   3.     It will increase the keeping time of organs during organ’s transportation. 

           Indeed, organs for transplantation are kept in a mix of salt and water and 

           it does not last long (4 hours for a heart) but lugworm blood will allow to 

           double the time for a heart and triple the time for a kidney. Hemarina is 

           currently working on this method and had already tried it; the results are 

           satisfying.

   
   

   
   

        This project is still in its early stage of development but think about what this innovation could accomplish in a near future. What if we were able to replace human blood by a more efficient blood that can be kept longer and that can be use in other medical purposes that allow to save lives. And what if, in a short period of time after this, we will able to have on screen information about the level of stocks of the blood and/or the product, where it is situated, how long it will take to deliver the product, … This innovation could be used efficiently through digital business.

   
   

   
   

         Exporting this innovation into digital transformation could change the way of doing medicine and our lives. Increasing oxygen into blood and organs will increase the time of stocking and this, could allow the automation of medicine. For instance, creating a machine, interconnected to a unique system, that you could carry with you and in case of accident the machine could detect your needs and send the information to the platform and thus allow the rescuers to arrive with the right materials (IoT systems) and save your life. Furthermore, they will be able to carry with them, at all time, little blood pills in case of hemorrhage (hemorrhage is one of the biggest cause of death when implies accidents). Increasing the supply of blood would erase the scarcity and decrease the price. These Medical Machines could be used by rescuers all around the world, in war zones, natural catastrophes or wherever there are a lot of victims, and send information on the rescuers’ needs in order to save lives.