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Your Signature In Blood
Blood doners get a pen filled with their blood so they can sign important, like really important documents. | |
Add gravitas to those important contracts like selling you soul to the devil, or pledging fealty to your favorite political group, (but I repeat myself). Signing with a regular pen just doesn't do it justice.
So to get more people to donate blood, as a gift, you get some of it back in a pen. The donation
centers have all the equipment necessary to create these and the blood is treated using whatever chemicals are necessary to make it work, not clot, last as long as regular ink, but it IS your blood.
Lending somebody money? Imagine the look on their face when you sign the contract with one of these. "Yea, I prefer to sign in human blood, I just take these contracts really seriously." You can tell them it's yours or not. Might want to remain mysterious. If they ask questions just smile, shake hands and say "I'm happy to do business with you. Very happy."
I think the other signator might work extra hard not to breach that agreement.
ADDENDUM: A little lighter at the other end that exudes fire might be a nice touch. Sign your name, blow it out and wink at the other party. (Be sure to let them sign first though.)
Bob Partington’s blood pen
https://www.trendhu...lood-pen-partington
[a1, Dec 17 2022]
Not blood, but...
https://news.artnet...-art-forgery-954971
Your DNA in paint for authenticating [neutrinos_shadow, Dec 18 2022]
Kevin McCarthy needs this pen
https://www.gocomic...ybennett/2023/01/07
Proving once again, cartoonists read the Halfbakery [a1, Jan 07 2023]
[link]
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Though not Red Cross, some people have made blood pens. Even with anti-clotting agents, any kind of fountain pen, ball point, etc tends to get clogged up. Dip-style pens - the style Old Nick himself or his agents might have handed you - would work, but I don’t know about the permanence of the ink. The persistence of blood stains has a lot to do with the clotting factors you’d need to inhibit in a writing implement. |
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Artist Bob Partington made a bizarre variety that looks like it had to be filled right before use, maybe that avoids the clogging issue. |
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I suppose the finished pen would only require 10% blood, with alcohol, acetone and whatnot, but you could honestly state that the blood within is 100% yours. |
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I thought red biros used blood as standard? There must be billions in use around the world already |
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Now THAT should be tried out as a conspiracy theory. |
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I've heard of putting your DNA into paint/ink for authenticity (see linky) but straight blood is next-level (not sure if it's UP a level, or down...). |
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//[...] some people have made blood pens. Even with anti-clotting agents, any kind of fountain pen, ball point, etc tends to get clogged up.// |
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Red fountain pen ink is readily available, and I understand it to be a water-based composition containing the dye eosin. |
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Therefore, the solution to me seems fairly simple. Isolate blood serum, (the fluid and solute component of blood which does not play a role in clotting). Basically, just let the blood clot, then centrifuge and take off the fluid. This will remove the clotting factors, blood cells and other crap which would clog the nib.
Then the manufacturer could simply dilute down a stock solution of the other ink ingredients with blood serum. |
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3 (and now we know) Have the user's DNA readily readable. |
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The actual chemistry to do that's beyond me, especially now that we know the DNA has to be left intact. Why? I don't know, it just does. |
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DNA can be prone to shearing if it's very long. Provided you don't need very long chains (like, over 5kb or so), I don't think it would be hard to extract some from the pellet, and put it back into the ink. |
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DNA preps are often stored in TE buffer(contains Tris - a pH buffer, and EDTA - which chelates cations, specifically Mg2+).
DNA is a chemically fairly stable molecule at pH 8, and without magnesium ions DNA nucleases don't work.
So I think provided you can make an ink which is buffered to pH8 and doesn't need cations, you're golden. |
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And if Blade is to be believed, EDTA would protect the ink from vampires, too. |
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Well this idea just gets better and better! |
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