Incredible lecture on biology

Captain Furball

Thought all you crowd might enjoy this lecture.
And a few questions for you when your finished watching it.
How far do you think you are away from making a heart or any other
organ for the general public?

tallaght01

Captain Furball wrote: »

How far do you think you are away from making a heart or any other
organ for the general public?

I haven't watched the video, but it better not be more of your conspiracy stuff, mister :P

Good question about the heart. At a basic level, it's function is so simple, that you'd imagine the production of an artificial one should be possible. In fact someone was telling me a while ago they were at a cardiac conference in Germany, where it was talked about.

But I imagine we're a LONG way away from it.
BUt with stem cell technology etc, you just never know when there will be a breakthrough.

Captain Furball

I'm sure you will enjoy it.There's no mention of aliens or anything like that haha.

I never thought about a heart as being simple but i think your right.
After watching this video please update and tell me how long we are away from it.
The video both scared me and made me hopeful at the same time.
It blew me away to be honest with you.

Jessibelle

In college, we learnt about a doctor, Patrick Shenot, in Philadelphia who is running a clinical trial involving performing a bladder transplant with an organ built with this patient's own cells. The patient's cells were grown in a lab, and then seeded on a biodegradable bladder-shaped scaffold, which, after a period of time when the scaffold supports sufficent regrown cells, is implanted into the patient. The scaffold dissolves after a period of time leaving a new, functioning organ. If it's possible with bladder cells, heart, lungs etc couldn't be too far off could they?
I'll try and find a link to the research or any further information for ya.

Jessibelle

Here's a link to the paper I was given in college about it:
http://www.nature.com/ki/journal/v76/n2/full/ki200981a.html

Jessibelle

This is a link to a CBS news piece on similar work by other scientists also.
http://dotsub.com/view/8d948fb7-9c22-4a4f-a8ea-896c02a8f57f

tallaght01

Watched the first few mins of the video before I left for work, and thought it was pretty entertaining actually. It hadn't gotten to the biology yet. But he was talking about economics. I don't know how rigorous it is, but it was interesting to watch.

Thanks for the link to the paper jesibelle. The abstract looks fascinating, and I've asked our library to send me the full thing.

drzhivago

tallaght01 wrote: »

I haven't watched the video, but it better not be more of your conspiracy stuff, mister :P

Good question about the heart. At a basic level, it's function is so simple, that you'd imagine the production of an artificial one should be possible. In fact someone was telling me a while ago they were at a cardiac conference in Germany, where it was talked about.

But I imagine we're a LONG way away from it.
BUt with stem cell technology etc, you just never know when there will be a breakthrough.

What about taking human stem cell and incorporating into pig embryo
That way HLA type would be human for rejection purposes wouldnt it

There is a term for this but dont know it

Would seem to solve our donor issues, we use pigs for food why not for organs.

tallaght01

drzhivago wrote: »

What about taking human stem cell and incorporating into pig embryo
That way HLA type would be human for rejection purposes wouldnt it

There is a term for this but dont know it

Would seem to solve our donor issues, we use pigs for food why not for organs.

There have been trials with genetically engineered pigs, as far as I'm aware. This is a definite possibility in the short-term.

There's even talk of transplanting pig thymus at the same time, so as to stop rejection.

Not in any way an expert on any of this. BUt I think there's going to be human trials once the monkey trials show some better results.

Wibbs

Jessibelle wrote: »

If it's possible with bladder cells, heart, lungs etc couldn't be too far off could they?

Yea but even from a non expert view, a bladder is basically a bag. I would think it's pretty simple even in membrane cross section? Its structure isnt that complex at all when you compare it to a heart, or a lung or liver. You would need a simple enough mould or scaffold and away you go. I'd say we're a fair bit away from building a heart, though you never know, someone in a shed somewhere could be close to a breakthrough.

Jessibelle

I know you can engineer cardiac tissues on an extracellular matrix but I'm not so sure about the complete organ. (see here, for more info), and I think, (although I can't find the link at the moment ), that a similar matrix can be used for liver cells, so hopefully the breakthrough in the shed isn't too far off

If the swine implants were/are going ahead though, would that not have huge moral implications for a large part of the world population, (I'm thinking, for example, people who hold Jewish or Muslim beliefs) as if they had to recieve an organ, on religious grounds, morally they couldn't accept? Would it create a two tiered donation system whereby human organs would only be given to those from particular religious or socio-ecconomic backgrounds?