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Growing New Organs in the Lab
(Tuesday June 09 2009)
 | From Singularity Hub: "Why transplant an organ when you can grow yourself a new one? This research isn't something that might happen in the distant future. It's being used today to grow fresh organs, open up new ways to study disease and the immune system, and reduce the need for organ transplants. ... So how many different types of human organs have been grown and transplanted? The lab-grown bladders are among the only transplants of an entire organ, but a wide variety of partial organ transplants have taken place. Skin cells are regularly grown in culture and grafted onto patients' bodies. A graft was grown from a patient's trachea cells and transplanted to replace part of her airway that had degraded due to disease. Cartilage has been grown and transplanted into a patient's knee. ... Merely a decade ago, tissue engineering was still a new field that struggled to find funding and support. Today, thousands of scientists worldwide are coordinating efforts to reach new breakthroughs, and the demonstrated potential of these methods has helped bring in investors." |
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