He Studied How to Transport Blood to Wounded Marines

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Peter Frazier, who wears a dark blue shirt, in a large indoor track area of a building. Text on large windows behind him reads, “Cornell University.” Liam Kennedy for The New York Times

Lost Science

He Studied How to Transport Blood to Wounded Marines

Peter Frazier’s lab at Cornell worked to improve how blood was stored and transported for armed forces. Then he received a stop-work order.

Listen · 2:58 min

Lost Science is an ongoing series of accounts from scientists who have lost their jobs or funding after cuts by the Trump administration. The conversations have been edited for clarity and length. Here’s why we’re doing this.

Interview by Alexa Robles-Gil

Peter Frazier: I lead a research program that works with the Navy and the Marine Corps on logistical decision making. To succeed in any mission, armed forces require food, water, ammunition and medical supplies. Often these needs are urgent, and the transport vehicles delivering them may be under fire.

The goal of our project is to provide Marine logisticians with modern, artificial-intelligence-based tools to better determine how to get supplies where they need to go. ... One critical item to transport is blood. After a traumatic injury, people have a higher survival rate if they receive a transfusion within an hour. That window is difficult to meet when someone is wounded near a combat area, especially because blood is perishable and must be refrigerated. Demand is also highly variable; sometimes you need none, and sometimes you need a lot.

I led a team of students developing software, based on mathematical models, to provide recommendations on how much blood to store in various locations. We worked with blood logistics officers to refine the program. Then, in April 2025, I received a message from the Department of Defense: All funding had been frozen.

It made no sense. We were working to save the lives of Marines — why was our funding being frozen?

{snip}

Alexa Robles-Gil is a science reporter and a member of the 2025-26 Times Fellowship class, a program for journalists early in their careers.

[SheltieLover]

1. Kick

[Irish_Dem]

2. Wounded soldiers will want healthcare and disability payments.

Trump doesn't have time or money for this.

[Pisces]

3. They are planning for the robots. Less people in the military more robots, robot dogs, drones. They don't

Need blood.