Blood, 1955, Vol. 10, No. 4, pp. 370-376.
© 1955 American Society of Hematology, Inc.
The Chemical Composition of Normal Human Red Blood
Cells, including Variability among Centrifuged Cells
HANS G. KEITEL 1,
H. BERMAN 1,
H. JONES 1, and
E. MACLACHLAN 1
1 Children’s Medical Service, Massachusetts General Hospital, Department of
Pediatrics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, and the Laboratory of Kidney
and Electrolyte Metabolism, National Heart Institute, National Institutes of Health,
Public Health Service, U. S. Department of health, Education, and Welfare, Bethesda
14, Maryland.
1. Red cells from different layers of centrifuged cells vary in composition.
Cells obtained from the upper layer, which is relatively richer in reticulocytes,
contain more water, sodium, potassium, chloride and phosphorus than the remaining cells.
2. The direct method of analysis of red blood cells using a constricted type
centrifuge tube to separate the entire red cells sample from buffy layer cells and
from plasma avoids the errors in direct analysis caused by different cell population in upper and lower layers of centrifuged cells and the cumulative errors
inherent in indirect analysis.
3. Using the direct method and a constricted type centrifuge tube, the means
and standard deviations of the water and mineral content of the erythrocytes
and plasma of 11 normal males and 11 normal females were determined. Males
were found to have a higher sodium content of red cells and plasma.
4. The sum of the molal concentrations of sodium, potassium, chloride and
phosphorus in red cells is not always equal to the sum of the molal concentrations of these minerals in the plasma.
Submitted on April 20, 1954
Accepted on June 11, 1954
