is it true that your blood is blue?
956109
In humans and other hemoglobin-using creatures, oxygenated blood is bright red. This is due to oxygenated iron in the red blood cells. Deoxygenated blood is a darker shade of red, which can be seen during blood donation and when venous blood samples are taken. However, due to an optical effect caused by the way in which light penetrates through the skin, veins typically appear blue in color. This has led to a common misconception that venous blood is blue before it is exposed to air. Another reason for this misconception is that medical charts always show venous blood as blue in order to distinguish it from arterial blood which is depicted as red on the same chart.
278481
It could depending on what you have had to eat. If you eat or drink something with blue coloring in it, it can turn blue.
1102291
How can you prove the color Blue is Blue? what if it is really yellow, and all along we have been calling it Blue?\n\nSome one must have tought me that Blue is Blue, and I never stoped calling it blue. It's blue because no one every proved other wise. It's what I was raised with, calling it Yellow would sound funny to me and others, no one would understand me.\n\nI think we are born, we learn every thing we can, and we then put the peices in as we can understand them. \nI dont know if I am real or not, but I choose to beleive I am, for what reason is beyong me, perhaps I was raised to think I am real, and so I am. I cant prove it either way, Im just comfortable thinking that I am.
280752
When the blood is returning to the heart through veins, it is blue because it has delivered its oxegyn and nutrients.  Once it returns to the heart and starts making its trip back through arteries, it is red again.\n\nBlood exposed to the outside air will always retain its red color, even if a vein is severed because once it leaves the body, oxygen in the air will change it back to red.
806918
Where does it appear blue? Never heard of that!
93042
can also indicate lead posioning. do you have any blueness around your finger nails? if so go to a doctor soon, like yesterday
3117
red, the blue thing is a myth....
630374
Clear blood? That's funny.\n\nRed corpuscles carry oxygen and cause blood to be red. It doesn't turn red, it is red. When you have blood drawn it isn't exposed to outside oxygen and it is still red. Blood is exposed to oxygen every time you breath. If you don't breath, you turn blue. Run in a marathon, your face turns red. Simple as that.
1139400
In the circulatory system, venous blood or peripheral blood is blood returning to the heart. With one exception (the pulmonary vein) this blood is deoxygenated and high in carbon dioxide, having released oxygen and absorbed CO2 in the tissues. It is also typically warmer than arterial blood, has a lower pH, has lower concentrations of glucose and other nutrients, and has higher concentrations of urea and other waste products.\n\nVenous blood can be obtained by venesection or phlebotomy, or in small quantities by fingerprick. Most medical laboratory tests are conducted on venous blood, with the exception of arterial blood gases.\n\nVenous blood is often depicted as blue in color in medical diagrams, and veins sometimes look blue when seen through the skin. However, venous blood is actually a dark red color, while arterial blood is bright red. The appearance of blood as dark blue is a wavelength phenomenon of light, having to do with the reflection of blue light away from the outside of venous tissue if the vein is @ 0.02in deep or more. This is due to the difference in color between deoxyhemoglobin and oxyhemoglobin; the red color ultimately originates from the iron atom in heme. If blood is drawn for a medical test, the dark red color can be seen; however, if it is exposed to oxygen in the air, it will turn bright red like arterial blood.\n\nArterial blood is taken from any easily accessible artery (typically either radial, brachial or femoral) or out of an arterial line. The syringe is prepacked and contains a small amount of heparin, to prevent coagulation or needs to be heparinised, by drawing up a small amount of heparin and squirting it out again.\n\nOnce the sample is obtained, care should be taken to eliminate visible gas bubbles, as these bubbles can dissolve into the sample and cause inaccurate results. The sealed syringe is taken to a blood gas machine. If the sample cannot be immediately analyzed it should be chilled in an ice bath to slow metabolic processes that may also cause inaccuracy. The machine aspirates this blood from the syringe and measures the pH and the partial pressures of oxygen and carbon dioxide and the bicarbonate concentration, as well as the oxygen saturation of hemoglobin. Some machines can also measure glucose, lactate, hemoglobin and limited electrolytes (sodium and potassium).\n\nThe results are usually available within five minutes, and are now ready for interpretation.
228065
Look down there..\nThe *.pdf is most detailed and informative.\n\nI am stunned at the total lack of sense displayed by some of these answers! Blood is red! Oxygen poor blood is more 'purpley' in colour but not blue. NONE OF THE BLOOD CIRCULATING INSIDE YOUR BODY IS BLUE!!!
525270
They have blue blood, which is a result of its high content in copper-based hemocyanin instead of the iron-based hemoglobin which is red.
942407
normally blue because the oxygen diffuses blue light most.
908467
Almost all vertebrates use the iron compound hemoglobin as the oxygen-transporting compound in their blood. Oxygenated hemoglobin is bright red, unoxygenated darker red. Many invertebrates use a copper compound rather than an iron compound to transport oxygen, so their blood is blue-green. I believe there is some arctic fish which also has blue-green blood, for the same reason.
1104888
In humans and other hemoglobin-using creatures, oxygenated blood is a bright red in its color. This is due to oxygenated iron in the red blood cells. Deoxygenated blood is a darker shade of red, which can be seen during blood donation and when venous blood samples are taken. However, due to an optical effect caused by the way in which light penetrates through the skin, veins typically appear blue in color. This has led to a common misconception that before venous blood is exposed to air it is blue.\n\nread more at\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood\n\n-unpredicktaboh-
78519
I can tell you why democrats are blue now. Look back to 1980. Since then, the only democratic President happens to be a lying cheater. That sure would make me blue.
257326
Yes. It means your liver is working very well to clear your blood of toxins.\n\nHigh bilirubin levels lead to a yellow skin and eyes and is called jaundice.
731030
De-oxygenated blood is blueish. THe blood inside your veins, if you could somehow look at it without exposing it to oxygen, would appear blue. It's isn't as if the walls of your veins are one color and the blood inside is a different color.