Radiation shielding in the blood?

I wanted a creature that produces something in its blood to protect itself from SEP (solar energetic particles) and GCR (galactic cosmic rays). The skin of the creature is normally sufficient protection, but the world has radiation bursts which can penetrate this layer, and necessitate a second line of defense.

I wasn't sure what sort of cell would be most effective for this. Possibly a variation of blood cells with a high iron concentration? Or, perhaps the creature could process other metals/minerals for this process, maybe even by processing some lead. Octopi process higher concentrations of copper, already.

Something like 0.05% of the blood is iron, so that's not much of a radiation shield. But then, that's just used to help with oxygen transfer, so cells specifically made to endure/block radiation and carry high metal contents might ferry larger percentages.

It's quite possible you'd be better off just growing more muscle in these areas, and having a cleanup crew to get rid of dead and mutated muscle after a radiation burst.

posted almost 7 years ago

Johnny‭

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