A DIELECTRIC STUDY ON HUMAN BLOOD AND PLASMA Abdul Rauf Department of Physics, PYP Jazan University, Jazan, K.S.A E-mail: abdul_rauf148@yahoo.com Abstract: The paper reports electrical properties of human blood and plasma of belonging to different physiological and environmental conditions. Dielectric parameters such as dielectric constant, dielectric loss and electrical conductivity of human blood and plasma of groups A, B, AB and O are measured at the frequency of 1kHz using digital LCZ meter. It is found that the values of dielectric constant, dielectric loss and electrical conductivity are high in plasma, low in 90% packed erythrocytes and hemolysed blood, and in between in whole blood irrespective of blood group but these dielectric parameters are more or less same in 90% packed red blood cells (RBC) and hemolysed blood. Groupwise differences in dielectric parameters in the case of plasma are not evident, but could be found in whole blood, hemolysed blood and 90% packed RBC. The study reveals that the significant variation in dielectric parameters could be attributed to the cellular concentration and also due to the presence of erythrocyte membrane, which separates the cell interior (hemoglobin) and cell exterior (plasma). Hence, it is the cell membrane, which characterizes the electrical properties of the most biologically important tissue – the blood. Key words: Human blood, Blood groups (a, B, AB & O),Dielectric properties, LCR meter. 1. Introduction The blood serves as the principal transport medium of the body, carrying oxygen, and nutrients, messages to the tissues and waste product and CO 2 to the organs of excretion. In other words, blood is described as a fluid connective tissue. The blood plays many important roles in coordinating the individual cells into a whole complex organism. Asami et al [1] reported the electrical properties like membrane capacitance C m , dielectric increment K, of yeast cells suspended in KCl solution by bridge method in the frequency range of 1kHz to 100 MHz. The C m was obtained to be 1.6 F/cm 2 . They also developed the yeast cell model to explain their results. Schwan [2] studied the electrical properties of biological cells and tissues at very low frequencies and discussed the mechanisms responsible for such properties. Schwan [3] analysed the dielectric data of biological material obtained from advanced dielectric techniques. He proposed three major and distinct relaxation effects which characterise the total dielectric response from d.c. to GHz, and several minor ones are superimposed. International Journal of Science, Environment and Technology, Vol. 2, No 6, 2013, 1396 – 1400 ISSN 2278-3687 (O) Received Nov 13, 2013 * Published Dec 2, 2013 * www. ijset.net