• Question: Can you grow a human organ inside other type of animal?

    Asked by arturo-bartolome@stpauls. to Anais, katy, Lauren, Richard, Stuart on 11 Mar 2016.
    • Photo: Lauren Laing

      Lauren Laing answered on 11 Mar 2016:

      There is a great shortage of organs for donation in the UK, and the waiting list is very long! In the USA, human organs are being grown in animals using a technique that is likely to be approved by the Home Office, who regulate these things in the UK.

      In America, pigs and sheep have been implanted with embryos which have both animal and human DNA. The idea is that when the hybrid animals are fully grown, their organs will be fully transplantable into patients without rejection because they carry human genetic material.

      There is lots of debate around these techniques, some people argue that the benefits of producing more organs for transplants far out weight the negatives. But one thing is for sure, these things will be tightly regulated by the government!

    • Photo: Anais Kahve

      Anais Kahve answered on 13 Mar 2016:

      This is very current news. Take a look at this news article:
      http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/science/science-news/12093058/Human-organs-grown-in-animals-could-be-given-green-light-in-Britain.html
      It says that scientists are trying to grow human organs in pigs. Some people would say that this is fantastic news because as Lauren says human organs are in short supply. But other people would think that this that is very controversial as it might make people less respectful of their own bodies if they know that it is so easy to get a replacement organ. Should we be so willing to replace the livers of people who are knowingly damaging their livers by drinking alcohol? What is the right thing to do?

    • Photo: Richard Friend

      Richard Friend answered on 14 Mar 2016:

      Yes! This is right on the cutting edge of science and technology. Whether we should or not is a different matter. Personally if I had an organ that was failing and we could grow another one I’d be more than happy to accept it. This would be really useful in cultures where organ donation is really uncommon, or if people have a rare genetic makeup so an organ donor would be unlikely.

    • Photo: Stuart Atkinson

      Stuart Atkinson answered on 15 Mar 2016:

      Even human to human transplantation is very difficult because the body’s immune system tends to attack anything foreign, so the idea of taking an animal organ and putting it into a human is even more problematic. This process is known as xenotransplantation.

      The closest animal relative to man is the chimpanzee. However, they are an endangered species, but an surprising candidate is the pig. To make the process more likely to success scientists have genetically changed the pig by replacing certain pig genes with human ones, to fool the body into accepting the transplanted tissue. There has already been success in treating people with Parkinson’s disease or liver failure by this technique.

      The idea of growing organs for transplant would certainly be a huge change to the waiting list system we have at present, but it would be also be a huge shift in our way of thinking about the value of organs. As Anais mentions, would people be more likely to abuse their bodies with smoking and drinking if they thought they could get replacement organs?

      This is cutting edge stuff and highly topical. One thing is for sure – most people have a strong reaction to the idea, either for or against.

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