A bag of animal whole blood isn't a single product. It's cells suspended in plasma, kept liquid by an anticoagulant, and any one of those parts might be the reason you ordered it. Below, what you're actually buying, and a closer look at the washed red cells that are the working reagent in hemagglutination and complement assays.
What's in whole blood
Whole blood is roughly 45% cells by volume and 55% plasma. The cells are overwhelmingly red blood cells, with white cells and platelets making up less than 1%. The plasma carries albumin, immunoglobulins, clotting factors, complement, hormones and electrolytes. Whole blood is the starting material when you need the cells alive and the plasma present: flow cytometry and hematology, leukocyte isolation, whole-blood stimulation assays, and preparing your own plasma, serum or red-cell reagents.
The anticoagulant defines the product: EDTA preserves cell morphology and is the hematology standard. Heparin leaves calcium in place for functional assays, and citrate suits coagulation work. Alsever's solution, a citrate-glucose-saline preservative, keeps red cells viable for weeks and is the traditional choice when the cells are headed for agglutination or hemolysis assays. Our whole blood from rabbit, bovine, chicken and pig is collected into each of these, so the anticoagulant is chosen at collection rather than added afterwards.
Age of animal and sterility appear in the product name for the same reason. Young and mature animals differ in cell counts and antibody background, and non-sterile blood is fine for short cell preparations while cell culture or extended incubation calls for a sterile draw.
Red blood cells as a reagent
Red cells earn their place on the shelf through two properties. Their biconcave shape gives them a large, deformable membrane that lyses cleanly and releases hemoglobin, an easily measured chromophore (PMC). And their surfaces carry species- and strain-specific antigens that antibodies, viruses and lectins agglutinate.
Hemolytic complement assays use sheep cells sensitized with antibody as the classical-pathway target and unsensitized rabbit cells as the alternative-pathway target, with the released hemoglobin as the readout. Hemagglutination and HI assays use chicken, turkey or guinea pig cells to titer influenza and other hemagglutinating viruses. Antibody screening and blood-group work use panels of typed cells.
For all of these the cells have to be washed free of plasma, which carries antibodies and complement of its own, and resuspended at a known concentration. We supply washed rabbit red blood cells in citrate-buffered saline for exactly this, ready to count and dilute.
Handling
Keep whole blood and red cells at 2 to 8 °C and never freeze them; freezing lyses the cells. Use whole blood within a few days of collection for cellular work. Washed cells in a preservative solution keep longer, but look for hemolysis (a pink supernatant) before each use and wash again if you see it. Bring cells to room temperature and mix gently before counting, and never vortex.
Because we collect from our own rabbits and from other species on a schedule, whole blood can be drawn into the anticoagulant, volume and sterility you specify and shipped the day it's collected. Ask us about custom draws, washed cells from other species, or reserved animals for a longer study.