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C. 500BC Alcmaeon of Croton, who performs dissections on animals distinguishes veins from arteries.
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C.400BC Hippocrates theorized that the body was made up of four properties: blood, phlegm, black bile, and yellow bile. He stated that the body became sick when the properties were out of balance, and that the cause of illnesses are natural rather than magical, as was popularly believed.
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C.300BC Herophilus of Chalcedon performs a public dissection on a human cadaver in Egypt. He was able to further differentiate veins and arteries, and named several parts of the brain (ie. the cerebrum).
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Claudius Galenus finds that blood travels through the arteries, and theorizes that blood is made in the kidneys and travels through the veins to the rest of the body. He states that the systems for veins and arteries are seperate from each other. Not all of Galen's findings were correct.
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PDFIbn al-Nafis, a physician from egypt, discovered the correlation between the lungs and blood vessels interacting for blood and air. He also elaborated on the relationship between coronary arteries and cardiac muscle.
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Italian anatomist Andreas Vesalius publishes De Humani Corporis Fabrica. In it, Vesalius produced detailed illustrations of dissections, superior to any that had been produced in that time.
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Italian anatomist, Fabricius, published On the Valves in Veins, which had the first drawings of vein valves.
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William Harvey explained the circulaton of blood within the body and how the heart was responsible for pumping it. It was a landmark discover in the history of physiology.
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Jan Swammerdam is accredited with being the first person to observe and describe a red blood cell. He also performed studies on muscle contractions, and was one of the first to use microscopes in his observations.
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Marcello Malpighi observed the capillary system using a rudimentary microscope. He also performed studies on the skin, kidneys, and spleen.
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Richard Lower, who studied at oxford, performed the first blood transfusion. His patients were two dogs.
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Jean-Baptiste Denis performed blood transfusions from animals, such as sheeps and calves, to humans. The patients recieved no ill effects.
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One of Jean-Baptiste Denis' patients died, causing his reputation to be tarnished. He sue, and then the French parliament banned all blood transfusions involving humans.
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Willia Hewson performed research on the coagulation of blood. He provided an expose on what is now commonly known as fibrogen.
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Philip Syng Physick is given the credit for the first human to human blood transfusion. However ,his work was not published, and only acknowledged in the footnote of a medical journal.
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James Blundell performed the first officially recorded blood transfusion. He injected a patient suffering from internal bleeding with blood from multiple donors. The patient died.
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Sir William Osler observed that the clogging in blood vessels resulted from small cells in the bone marrow. The cells are later called platelets.
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Karl Landsteiner established three main human blood groups. His discovery is made through agglutination.
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Alfred von Decastello and Adriano Sturli, colleagues of Karl Landsteiner, discover an AB blood type
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Dr. Ludvig Hektoen suggested that blood donors and patients be checked for compatibility. He performed several successful transfusions.
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Dr. Richard Lewisohn formulated the optimum cuncentration of sodium citrate that can be put into blood to prevent it from coagulating, and still be safe to put in a patient.
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Dr. Oswald Robertson collected type O blood for the war effort in WWI, establishing the first blood depot.
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Percy Lane Oliver set up a 24 hour blood donor service in England
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Dr. Serge Yudin performed a successful transfusion receiving donor blood from a cadaver. Soviets established a system to collect and store blood.
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Federico Duran-Jorda set up the Barcelona Blood-Transfusion Service to support the war effort in the Spanish civil war
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Dr. Bernard Fantus coined the term bllod bank to describe the blood collection program he began in chicago.
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Edwin Cohn discovers how to seperate plasma. This leads to to the ability to harvest and manufacture antibodies and proteins.
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Drs. Karl Landsteiner and Alexander Wiener discover the Rh blood group, after first becoming aware of an antibody in the blood of a stillborn.
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The American Red cross set up a civilian blood donor service to collect blood for the war effort. They collected over 13 million units of blood over the course of the war.
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Dr. Carl W. Walter invented a plastic bag to store blood, as an alternative to glass vials that were fragile and easy to contaminate.
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Dr. Baruch Blumberg discovered a new substance from Hepatitus B that triggered antibodies in the body. From this, a test could be performed to identify those with hepatitus B
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The first cases of AIDS began appearing. The disease was thought to be related to homosexuality because of its prelavance in gay men.
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Researchers at Dr. Luc Montagnier's lab isolate the irus that causes aids. It is labeled LAV (lymphadenopathy-associated virus)
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Dr. Robert Gallo discovers the T cell, and determine that it is the cause of AIDS
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After finding that people were infected with AIDS from blood transfusions, a screen test is set up for donors.
