new blood type
Though rare, it is estimated now that over 200,000 people in Europe and a similar number in North America are Vel-negative, about 1 in 2,500.
For these people, successive blood transfusions could easily turn to kidney failure and death. So, for sixty years, doctors and researchers have hunted -- unsuccessfully -- for the underlying cause of this blood type.
But now a team of scientists from the University of Vermont and France has found the missing molecule -- a tiny protein called SMIM1 -- and the mystery is solved.
Last year, Ballif and Arnaud identified the proteins responsible for two other rare blood types, Junior and Langeris, moving the global count of understood blood types or systems from 30 to 32. Now, with Vel, the number rises to 33. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/03/130320155104.htm
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/emmm.201302466/pdf
For these people, successive blood transfusions could easily turn to kidney failure and death. So, for sixty years, doctors and researchers have hunted -- unsuccessfully -- for the underlying cause of this blood type.
But now a team of scientists from the University of Vermont and France has found the missing molecule -- a tiny protein called SMIM1 -- and the mystery is solved.
Last year, Ballif and Arnaud identified the proteins responsible for two other rare blood types, Junior and Langeris, moving the global count of understood blood types or systems from 30 to 32. Now, with Vel, the number rises to 33. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/03/130320155104.htm
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/emmm.201302466/pdf