Printing a human kidney (and other human organs and tissues)

Printing a human kidney (and other human organs and tissues)

www.ted.com

Surgeon Anthony Atala demonstrates an early-stage experiment that could someday solve the organ-donor problem: a 3D printer that uses living cells to output a transplantable kidney. Using similar technology, Dr. Atala's young patient Luke Massella received an engineered bladder 10 years ago; we meet him onstage.

(visit the link for the full news article)

just amazing its a 17 min vid the really good part is about 11mins in.this would open up the possibilities of deep space travel and or immortality. hope the ats community enjoys.I saw this on the news but had some trouble finding the vid online at first but finally did.This looks just like tech out of the 5th element or star ship troopers.

www.ted.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Very interesting!

I heard a few things about this a couple of years back, but this does seem a potential growth market for healthcare, combined with nanotech and whatnot. Highly ingenious stuff.

they are using this type of science to replicate food also kind of hard
to wrap my mind around printing out food and organs.

reply to post by GullibleUnderlord


well maybe eventually we will have star trek type replicator tech. who knows ? makes one question reality i know that.Are we nothing more than carbon based robots? are we a simulation advancements like this makes one wonder

reply to post by buddybaney


assuming no major doom happens can you just imangine how
life is going to be in 20 years?

God bless the USA, without America, this # wouldnt be possible!

And this will greatly extend life expectancies into the future. Just wait till they can regrow lungs, hearts, liver, etc.

We live in some interesting times!

reply to post by buddybaney


I think this is absolutely fantastic - almost as good as stem cell medicine.

Too bad all these wonderful breakthroughs aren't and won't be covered by health insurance. ...Only the rich get a shot at immortality.

Originally posted by soficrow
reply to post by buddybaney

 

I think this is absolutely fantastic - almost as good as stem cell medicine.

Too bad all these wonderful breakthroughs aren't and won't be covered by health insurance. ...Only the rich get a shot at immortality.

Maybe... but once replication/nano tech is common-place, there will be no need to be greedy. Of course, evil is as evil does and there will still be people trying to privatize essential human resources but I think we outnumber them

reply to post by Cuervo

once replication/nano tech is common-place, there will be no need to be greedy

It took over 30 years to get bone marrow transplants covered for leukemia - and several HUGE public outcries, much media muscle AND political drag.

...There's a lot out there right now that's already buried, like this will be. Even 10 years ago studies showed that doctors simply did not inform patients of problems or possible treatments if they knew the patients could not afford to move forward. This "approach" is now more than entrenched.

...One of the simplest ways to enforce Eugenics Policies is not to provide information about diagnosis OR treatment. The rationale is that if you're worth, you can pay for it - if you can't afford it, you don't need to know.

Originally posted by soficrow
reply to post by Cuervo

 

once replication/nano tech is common-place, there will be no need to be greedy

It took over 30 years to get bone marrow transplants covered for leukemia - and several HUGE public outcries, much media muscle AND political drag.

...There's a lot out there right now that's already buried, like this will be. Even 10 years ago studies showed that doctors simply did not inform patients of problems or possible treatments if they knew the patients could not afford to move forward. This "approach" is now more than entrenched.

...One of the simplest ways to enforce Eugenics Policies is not to provide information about diagnosis OR treatment. The rationale is that if you're worth, you can pay for it - if you can't afford it, you don't need to know.

I agree with how disgusting all those practices are. I'm just saying that, whether or not they like it, their opinions on wealth and eugenics will be irrelevant in 25 years or so. In order to do "print" a kidney, there needs to be in place a pantheon of technological breakthroughs (which will happen very soon) and those breakthroughs to get to that point will make the current standard of supply-and-demand economics obsolete. If not, we'll destroy ourselves.

Originally posted by soficrow
reply to post by Cuervo

 

once replication/nano tech is common-place, there will be no need to be greedy

It took over 30 years to get bone marrow transplants covered for leukemia - and several HUGE public outcries, much media muscle AND political drag.

...There's a lot out there right now that's already buried, like this will be. Even 10 years ago studies showed that doctors simply did not inform patients of problems or possible treatments if they knew the patients could not afford to move forward. This "approach" is now more than entrenched.

...One of the simplest ways to enforce Eugenics Policies is not to provide information about diagnosis OR treatment. The rationale is that if you're worth, you can pay for it - if you can't afford it, you don't need to know.

Enter the technological singularity.


also, check out this cool site.
www.futuretimeline.net...

I saw a show recently, I think it was Nova, where they were showing that it's now possible to "wash" the DNA out of organs, making them basically a blank slate as far as transplants. They were saying that this process reduces the chance of rejection to zero. It also allows for the use of things like pigs hearts for human transplant.

Pretty amazing what they can do these days.