Tag Archives: organ-transplants

The Next Frontier for mRNA Could Be Healing Damaged Organs

On a recent Thursday afternoon, researchers Lanuza Faccioli and Zhiping Hu wheeled an inconspicuous black and white plastic cooler from an operating room at a hospital in downtown Pittsburgh. Inside was a badly scarred liver, just removed from a 47-year-old man undergoing a transplant to receive a new one from …

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He Got a Pig Kidney Transplant. Now Doctors Need to Keep It Working

Richard Slayman made history on March 16 by becoming the first living person to receive a genetically edited pig kidney. This week, the 62-year-old Massachusetts resident reached another milestone by being discharged from the hospital after his groundbreaking procedure. Now comes the hard part: making sure his transplanted organ keeps …

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The Second Person to Get a Pig Heart Transplant Just Died

Lawrence Faucette, the 58-year-old patient with terminal heart disease who was the second person to receive a genetically engineered pig heart, died on October 30, according to a statement from the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore, where the transplant was performed. Faucette received the transplant on September 20 …

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A Monkey Got a New Kidney From a Pig—and Lived for 2 Years

Around the world, there aren’t enough donor kidneys available for everyone who needs one. Scientists are hoping pig kidneys could help ease the shortage, but first they must make sure the organs can keep working after transplant. In a step toward that goal, Massachusetts-based biotech company eGenesis reports today that …

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Scientists Just Tried Growing Human Kidneys in Pigs

In a first, researchers in China have used pigs to grow early-stage kidneys made up of mostly human cells. The advance is a step closer to producing organs in animals that could one day be transplanted to people. More than 100,000 people in the United States are on the national …

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