Surgeons working at Karolinska University Hospital in Sweden have taken a huge step forward for regenerative medicine by successfully executing the world’s first synthetic organ transplant. The donor-less transplant saved the life of a 36-year-old cancer patient, who is doing well now after having received a new windpipe grown from his own stem cells.
This story is about as international as it gets: The Eritrean patient, Andemariam Teklesenbet Beyene, was pursuing his doctorate in geology in Iceland when his trachea was consumed by an inoperable tumor that grew so bad that it was actually blocking his breathing. So 3-D scans of his windpipe were sent to scientists at University College London, which crafted a glass scaffold that was a perfect match for Beyene’s trachea and two main bronchi.
The scaffold was in turn was sent to Sweden, where it was soaked in stem cells from Beyene’s own bone marrow. The stem cells took hold and within just two days had filled the scaffold, creating a new trachea that is, biologically speaking, Beyene’s own tissue. A 12-hour operation by an Italian surgeon specializing in trachea operations removed Beyene’s windpipe and all signs of the cancer and then replaced it with the new, lab-grown organ.
That was a month ago. Today, Beyene is recovering well. Because the organ was grown from his own cells, there is no risk of his body rejecting it and no need for the harsh regimen of anti-rejection drugs that usually go hand in hand with an organ transplant. Moreover, there was no need to seek out a donor. In Beyene’s case, that was key. The tumor was increasingly blocking his breathing, and without the transplant he would have died. The clock was ticking, as it so often is in transplant situations.
From stem cell solution to transplantable organ in two days? That’s nothing short of amazing. Moreover, this is just the tip of the iceberg. Theoretically, this kind of procedure could be used to regenerate all kinds of different organs for transplant, eliminating the need (and wait) for donor organs and reducing the complications inherent in them.
Go Science.
This is awesome, it's amazing to see stem cell research start to fulfill its promise. It's exciting and I hope we see more complicated structures being put together.
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I saw this in the paper this morning. It's just awesome.
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If I recall from the WSJ article this morning, it isn't really a matter of complexity. The method they used only works on roughly cylindrical organs; they drip the stem cells onto the scaffold as it rotates, then use 'chemicals' to differentiate the cells into the specific cells needed.
So, no luck using this method on most other organs. Still an impressive accomplishment though!
Darmalus wrote:Very nice. How complicated is a trachea compared to, say, a kidney or a liver?
MUCH less complicated. A trachea is mostly support scaffolding with some epithelial cells providing protection/mucus cilia providing mechanical cleaning. A liver and kidney both have filtering functions, the kidneys also produce hormones regulating bone marrow production and blood pressure maintenance, the liver has on-going complex chemical reactions, vitamin storage, and both monitor and help maintain various levels of chemicals in the body.
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What about say, clitoris? Undoing genital mutilation would make a lot of people happy, like Egyptian immigrant women.
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The science of nerve regeneration is still in it's infancy, if even that far along, and the main purpose of a clitoris is sensory nerves. In contract, a segment of trachea can function just fine even without nerves, as can transplanted livers and kidneys which rely on chemical signaling.
A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory.Leonard Nimoy.
Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.- Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of Serenity, which sums up my feelings regarding the lawsuit discussed here.
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. - John F. Kennedy
I still don't think you can understate how big a deal this is as a sort of 'first step' towards possible future advances. And even if they can only do certain organs, like the trachea for now, how many people alone could that save?
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Eulogy wrote:What about say, clitoris? Undoing genital mutilation would make a lot of people happy, like Egyptian immigrant women.
We actually can repair that surgically already. The reason is quite simple: Female circumcisions are normally done by amateurs, and they do not actually cut off the whole clitoris. With some surgery (basically removing scar tissue above the remains of the clitoris, and some reshaping) and a bit of healing, we can restore it pretty well.
There are several surgeons (mostly plastic surgeons) across Europe who do that kind of operation, and plenty of them do it for free as well.
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Just as a note for those who weren't watching this area of medical science: "cloned" livers, bladders, kidneys, windpipes etc. have been grown and implanted on an experimental basis for a while now. The problem is that you need scaffolding for the cells to attach to. thats not so bad for things like windpipes or bladders, but for e.g. a liver this means they basicly need a donor liver and remove all cells from it, so that you can put the new ones on. Another problem until now was that it took MONTH to grow an organ. I don't know if this only took two days due to a windpipe being much easier or if this problem has been solved. Another little thing not mentioned in the article is that work is being done on turning normal cells into stem cells and it seems to look good. (to a layman. )
This is pre-WWII. You can sort of tell from the sketch style, from thee way it refers to Japan (Japan in the 1950s was still rebuilding from WWII), the spelling of Tokyo, lots of details. Nothing obvious... except that the upper right hand corner of the page reads "November 1931." --- Simon_Jester
I'm 27 now, I'm hoping that by the time I hit my mid 60's it will be possible to have some internal organs replaced with brand new ones from my own iPSCs
the liver has on-going complex chemical reactions, vitamin storage, and both monitor and help maintain various levels of chemicals in the body.
The liver is capable of rebuilding itself from near-scratch on its own. Even dumb liver tissue grown on a tiny scaffolding when transplanted into a patient can grow and build a full liver in a decent timescale. Before they just took a piece of liver from a relative, and both pieces regenerated.
Other organs do not, and some require very specific conditions or actions the organ itself has no control on to be formed properly. The development of most stuff is literally an origami of plates of tissue that then fuses where necessary.
Another major issue is that the organ's own cells don't form blood vessels nor blood to supply it. And you need decent blood vessels carrying nutritious fluid to have an organ of the right size. A breathpipe is basically a thin-walled tube, and I bet that they transplanted it well before it was actually complete, counting on the guy's own blood vessels responding to the call of the cells in the scaffolding to invade it fast.
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the liver has on-going complex chemical reactions, vitamin storage, and both monitor and help maintain various levels of chemicals in the body.
The liver is capable of rebuilding itself from near-scratch on its own. Even dumb liver tissue grown on a tiny scaffolding when transplanted into a patient can grow and build a full liver in a decent timescale. Before they just took a piece of liver from a relative, and both pieces regenerated.
If it's so damn easy, though, why haven't we seen lab-grown livers used for transplant?
A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory.Leonard Nimoy.
Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.- Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of Serenity, which sums up my feelings regarding the lawsuit discussed here.
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. - John F. Kennedy
Probably because this is cutting edge medical science. They are getting there, but it takes time to get good and confident at actually doing stuff after finding out it works... as I am sure both of you know.
This is pre-WWII. You can sort of tell from the sketch style, from thee way it refers to Japan (Japan in the 1950s was still rebuilding from WWII), the spelling of Tokyo, lots of details. Nothing obvious... except that the upper right hand corner of the page reads "November 1931." --- Simon_Jester
Broomstick wrote:
If it's so damn easy, though, why haven't we seen lab-grown livers used for transplant?
Livers in a bad enough shape to need a trasplant usually aren't so lively and/or might have cancerous cells too diffused to weed out safely. Anyway to grow a liver in a lab you still need the collagen matrix from a dead persons's liver (not in short supply, but bring rejection concerns) to use as scaffolding, fetal stem cells and there is some trouble getting livers of adequate size.
Are there any groups concerned over the use of adult stem cells as in this case? I had thought the debate, at least in the US, was only concerning embryonic stem cells.
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