DooKey
[H]F Junkie
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University of Texas Medical Branch researchers have successfully transplanted lab-grown lungs into pigs. They created lung scaffolds of pig lungs by removed all the cells and blood from pig lungs and then placed them in a vat of nutrients. The lungs started growing when they added cells from the recipient pigs' lungs and then they transplanted them after 30 days of growth. The transplants were successful and none of the pigs involved rejected the transplants. This is a huge step forward for this technology and could one day lead to the elimination of transplant lists. Imagine hospitals growing replacement organs for humans in the future. As far as I'm concerned this can't come soon enough. Read the paper here.
If all goes as hoped with the pig experiments, the researchers believe they could be just five to 10 years away from being able to create lab-grown lungs to transplant into people in compassionate use circumstances (people with life-threatening conditions and essentially no other treatment options).
If all goes as hoped with the pig experiments, the researchers believe they could be just five to 10 years away from being able to create lab-grown lungs to transplant into people in compassionate use circumstances (people with life-threatening conditions and essentially no other treatment options).