There is an episode in Elementary that involves the Horseshoe, its extraction and conservation. It is just a regular episode, but the visual presentation of the extraction was fascinating. I hope they are real. :)
goosejuice•Aug 12, 2026
They are indeed real.. weird. Like something out of starship troopers. I've held quite a few. Haven't given one a phlebotomy though.
jzelinskie•Aug 12, 2026
Has anyone on HN gotten the horseshoe crab pin and can share the story?
wuschel•Aug 12, 2026
A pin? I did and fought for the cause. Happy to share. See my other post in this thread.
y-curious•Aug 12, 2026
Few things look more cruel and dystopic than the rooms where they harvest the blood of horseshoe crabs
b40d-48b2-979e•Aug 12, 2026
Can't spell cruel and dystopic without Eli Lilly.
andsoitis•Aug 12, 2026
Is there any alternative to using horseshoe crab blood in the development of the pharmaceutical compounds that keep us safe?
beagle3•Aug 12, 2026
They are a (relatively) recent part of the production pipeline. Before introducing horseshoe crab blood, they used to inject rabbits and wait a couple of weeks. Now the wait has been reduced to minutes - which reduces storage costs and increases certainty.
But there are other options.
vlovich123•Aug 12, 2026
It’s in the article - Eli Lilly has largely switched to a synthetic protein.
borski•Aug 12, 2026
Recombinant factor C (rFC) has been available since 2003.
TFA alludes to it: “They have created a lab-made alternative to test medicines, so no crabs are needed.
“It is the exact same protein, it is just made through biotechnology,” Bolden said.
Bolden said scientists at Eli Lilly tested thousands of samples on hundreds of different products and determined the alternative performs the same or better than purified horseshoe crab blood does.
Starting in 2016, Eli Lilly started to switch its testing to the lab-made version. Now 80 percent of it is done using the alternative.
The company plans to entirely eliminate the use of crab blood.”
wuschel•Aug 12, 2026
> Now 80 percent of it is done using the alternative.
Did not follow the industry since 2018, but it is quite a feat switching the supply chains to the recombinant version. Good to hear that they managed to do it. I wonder how other Pharma and Medtech players are doing in that regard.
ggm•Aug 12, 2026
There's economics wrapped up in finding a reproducible synthetic replacement against harvesting. If climate change causes a drop in horseshoe crab availability we might see the pressure here.
sandworm101•Aug 12, 2026
Lol. They have survived many mass extinctions. The horseshoe crabs will be aeound long after we are all dead. Once we stop actively killing them, they will recover.
ggm•Aug 12, 2026
Good point. I guess they've weathered acidic oceans, eutrophication, you-name-it. However there is some reason to believe things like ocean acidification is happening significantly faster than in times past. Hard to be certain but that's what I read.
dyauspitr•Aug 12, 2026
Get real. Non-destructively taking blood from creatures that are basically one step above an automaton to save lots of lives is not problematic.
rob74•Aug 12, 2026
Well, only 83% non-destructive. According to the video (but omitted from the transcript for some reason) "one in every six crabs dies in the process".
mindhash•Aug 12, 2026
yep, if there was hint of cruelty in the matrix where machines harvested humans for energy, this may not be so different.
account42•Aug 12, 2026
Except for the sapience.
arcanemachiner•Aug 12, 2026
And the anthropocentrism.
wuschel•Aug 12, 2026
The horseshoe crab story comes up on HN now and then. Typical media game, the crabs crawled out their appointed time slot in the media publishing calendar.
Here is a full disclaimer (from the trenches of startup land): I co-founded and ran a biotech startup that tried to disintermediate that particular supply chain. We even flew to SF to speak to some of the YC chaps, and talked to a strategic buyer. Our technology R&D failed to deliver, unfortunately. And the market is fairly small. But I learned a great deal re that particular business, and a lot of more general lessons. All in all, a crazy run with so many crazy stories, I need to write them down one day.
Horseshoe crabs are truly fascinating animals in respect to their physique, lineage and behaviour. But these things one can read up on Wikipedia.
We had quite a bunch of them in our lab (and living room). They were supposed to be voracious predators to all things they can eat, but ours developed a rather expensive habit in captivity by only eating the most expensive of goods from the local fish market. They would not eat anything else.
intheitmines•Aug 12, 2026
The crab had correctly identified it's importance within the org and therefore comp structure
larodi•Aug 12, 2026
Most horseshoe related posts on HN come complete with abysmal amount of ads in the articles. Wonder why…
tzs•Aug 12, 2026
If you follow the whole process from the point of view of the horseshoe crab it is disturbingly similar to the stories many people who claim to be alien abduction victims tell.
Fokamul•Aug 12, 2026
I vote for stem cells extraction from babies in a same way crab blood is extracted.
8 Comments
But there are other options.
TFA alludes to it: “They have created a lab-made alternative to test medicines, so no crabs are needed.
“It is the exact same protein, it is just made through biotechnology,” Bolden said.
Bolden said scientists at Eli Lilly tested thousands of samples on hundreds of different products and determined the alternative performs the same or better than purified horseshoe crab blood does.
Starting in 2016, Eli Lilly started to switch its testing to the lab-made version. Now 80 percent of it is done using the alternative.
The company plans to entirely eliminate the use of crab blood.”
Did not follow the industry since 2018, but it is quite a feat switching the supply chains to the recombinant version. Good to hear that they managed to do it. I wonder how other Pharma and Medtech players are doing in that regard.
Here is a full disclaimer (from the trenches of startup land): I co-founded and ran a biotech startup that tried to disintermediate that particular supply chain. We even flew to SF to speak to some of the YC chaps, and talked to a strategic buyer. Our technology R&D failed to deliver, unfortunately. And the market is fairly small. But I learned a great deal re that particular business, and a lot of more general lessons. All in all, a crazy run with so many crazy stories, I need to write them down one day.
Horseshoe crabs are truly fascinating animals in respect to their physique, lineage and behaviour. But these things one can read up on Wikipedia.
We had quite a bunch of them in our lab (and living room). They were supposed to be voracious predators to all things they can eat, but ours developed a rather expensive habit in captivity by only eating the most expensive of goods from the local fish market. They would not eat anything else.