Nat Microbiol weighs a lot! It is found in human intestinal bacteria that enzymes can directly transform type A blood into type O blood!

June 25, 2019 / BIOON / - a team at the University of British Columbia found two enzymes that can convert type a blood to type O blood In a paper published in the journal Nature microbiology, the team described their metagenomic studies of bacteria in human feces and their findings Photo source: nature microbiology has four blood types: A, B, AB and O, which are not suitable for blood transfusion, except for O, which can be transfused to recipients, which makes it of high value The difference between blood groups is due to the presence of sugar molecules called blood antigens on the surface of red blood cells People with type A antigen are type a blood, people with type B antigen are type B blood, and both antigens are AB blood Type O is different because it has no antigens on its surface If the wrong type of antigen is found in the blood, the immune system will activate the immune response - because the type O red blood cells do not, they will not activate the immune response Previous studies by the UBC team have shown that some enzymes can convert a, B or AB to O by removing antigens In this new study, researchers found that two enzymes work together to convert type a blood into type O blood, which is present in human intestinal organisms The work involved transferring DNA from uncultured bacteria to E coli, and then using them to screen any microbe capable of removing antigens from the surface of red blood cells The team reported that their initial findings were not very positive - they did not find any microbes that could do the work But they did find two that could be done together The first is deacetylase, which converts antigens into amines The second group removed the amines, leaving a blood cell without antigens - type O blood cells The team plans to continue to study these enzymes to determine whether they can safely convert blood transfused into blood type O that can be transfused into the human body Reference: Peter rahfeld et al An enzymatic pathway in the human gut microbiology that converters a to universal O type blood, nature Microbiology (2019) Doi: 10.1038/s41564-019-0469-7