A kind-eyed Romanian doctor announced this week that he, along with a team of colleagues at Babeş-Bolyai University, had made a marvelous and potentially life-saving stride for medicine, science, and humanity following the successful completion of a round of testing on the artificial blood product they have devoted the last six years of their lives to developing. PROBABLY BECAUSE THEY ARE A BUNCH OF VAMPIRES.

Smithsonian reports that the blood substitute, which one would assume functions exactly like the vampire drink Tru Blood® on HBO's True Blood, is derived from the protein hemerythrin, a hemoglobin equivalent (extracted from sea worms) that is heartier and less vulnerable to stress. Professor Radu Silaghi-Dumitrescu is optimistic that a mixture made from a combination of this protein, albumin, and salt will one day function as "instant blood" — just add water.

Such a product would be worth its weight in gold to a devilish vampire like Silaghi-Dumitrescu who, were he but a simple human researcher, would probably feel a twinge of remorse at the fact his laboratory had been established in Romania's historic Transylvania region—a quirk of geography that would forever cast upon his serious and important work pale, unearthly pallor. But since he is a vampire, he has no feelings at all.

Recently, Silaghi-Dumitrescu, whose receding hairline and pleasant smile belie the murderous, terrifying, and yet faintly erotic bloodlust that informs his every action, injected his synthetic blood into mice and monitored them for ill effects. The doctor—who likely shared a bone-chilling "mwa ha ha" laugh with his vampire friends about the irony of them injecting blood into warm, living things when usually they are just sucking it out and then discarding the mangled corpses into polluted canals because they, as a species, have no regard for human life—found no ill effects.

Silaghi-Dumitrescu told Medical Daily that he's hopeful these developments will lead to clinical trials on humans within a couple years. Another thing he's probably hoping is that no one will bring garlic near him!

He cautioned that human testing is "an extra gentle subject" and then added, in his head, "I VAN TO DRINK YOUR BLAD."

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