#31: How Are Blood Groups Discovered?

Duration: 20 Minutes

The clinical importance of blood groups and their antigens lies largely in pregnancy and allogenic transfusion, but also in transplantation. Red cell alloimmunization drives the development of serologic and molecular reagents tools used to unravel blood group antibody specificities to help manage clinical decision making for the delivery of babies at a safe gestational age and for safe compatible transfusions.

The fascinating history of the discovery of the blood groups goes back to 1900 with the breakthrough that came when Dr. Karl Landsteiner, an Austrian scientist, discovered three human blood groups. These were the A, B and O blood groups. For this discovery he was awarded the Nobel Prize for medicine in 1930. Two students who worked with Karl Landsteiner discovered the fourth human blood group, the AB. These two were A. van Decastello and A. Sturli. These four blood groups together are what we today known as the ABO blood group system.

Now, 123 years after the first blood group discovered, how many blood groups are recognized? The clinical value is vast as many of the more recent blood group systems are associated with extremely rare antigen-negative phenotypes and null alleles requiring international searches for compatible blood. Learn in this podcast episode with Dr. Jill Storry what is the fascinating journey behind discovering blood groups and stay up to date on the latest blood groups that have been discovered.