Blood, Bone Marrow and Blood Types

This was a jammed pack full chapter as I am looking over my notes and see that I took 10 pages of notes. Wicked!!! In class this past week we talked about the blood, bone marrow and blood types.

In the picture below the blood cells look like cheerios....Dont they?

I learned that blood is made up of Red Blood Cells - Erythrocytes, White Blood Cells - Leukocytes and Platelets - Thrombocytes. This was funny. The way to remember the 5 categories of white blood cells is this saying: never let monkeys eat banana's.

N= Neurophils (70-80%) they are phagocytic cells which destroy foreign material and digest it
L= Lymphocytes (20-30%)
M= Monocytes (less than 10%) capable of many phagocytic events E= Eosinophil (3-8%) B= Basophil (less than 0.1%) releases Histamine, which is a blood vessel dilator

Above, L to R, a Erythrocyte, a Thrombocyte and a Leukocyte.

BONE MARROW:
Bone marrow is found and is easily taken out of the flat bones in our body. The flat bones are the sternum, scapula's and the flat bone in the pelvis. The most common place for Red Bone marrow to be taken out is in the hips because there is less muscle and adipose tissue there.

If I could be a cell in the body I would want to be a Totiponent cell because these cells have the capability to become any cell that it wants to in the human body. On the other hand Pluripotent cells are already specialized in what they are going to be. That must be boring.

Its crazy to think that our body is capable of doing so many things at once. You would think that we would crash from overloads like computers do but we don't. It is amazing to think that we make millions of new red blood cells everyday. that is EVERYDAY! But you would think we would become plugged up with so many red blood cells, but the old red blood cells make there way to the spleen where they die and get eaten by the Macrophages. Don't worry though, because if you do not have your spleen due to it being removed, then Your liver is doing all the work now. The life of a blood cell is 90-120 days.

BLOOD TYPES:
I just donated blood at the blood drive that was held here at EMCC. It was my very first time giving blood. I was not able to give too much because I started to think about it too much and was going to pass out. I can at least say that I did it and helped someone else. I do not know what type of blood that I have circulating in me. Which is should probably know. There are 4 types: A, B, AB and type Rh factor. It was interesting to see how it was possible to have a different blood type than a member of your family.