Today I came across something in my research for work that left me scratching my head in wonder and disbelief. There is a company based in San Diego called Organovo that has managed to connect a 3-D bio printer to a computer. What this means is that they are able to program a computer to replicate human blood vessels and organs. This is taken from the web page I was reading "The field of tissue engineering has come a long way since the 1980s, when MIT’s Robert Langer developed methods of encouraging certain types of organ cells to grow on polymer scaffolding. In recent years, a number of researchers have begun experimenting with technology that uses modified ink jet printers to lay down precise patterns of cells that grow together to form tissue. Anthony Atala, director of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, demonstrated how researchers at Wake Forest use similar technology to grow a human ear, bladder, and heart muscle. Gabor Forgacs showed in 2005 that it was possible to “print” a tube of living tissue, using droplets—or spheres—of viscous biological material from hamster ovary cells. When the cell spheres were printed in a ring and stacked on top of one another with the help of a supportive hydrogel, they fused together within 24 hours to form a tubular structure."(http://www.xconomy.com/san-diego/2010/01/08/san-diegos-organovo-develops-bio-printer-technology-to-engineer-new-organs/)
The long term goals of this company are to create livers, kidneys, and "other vital organs" that are in short supply for organ transplants.
On the one hand, I applaud the human race, these men in particular, who have managed to come up with this technology. Undoubtedly, for those with enough money, the benefits of getting a manufactured liver that matches your DNA will be beneficial. In the long run, this technology will probably save many lives as it will be relatively easy to grow the part you need instead of waiting for someone to die so you can have the necessary organ. On the other hand, the whole idea really creeps me out! It is just so Margaret Atwood like. All I can envision are long, windowless buildings like the many chicken barns one sees in the Maine countryside. Inside the temperature controlled environment will be various hooks connected to jugs of goop on one side and computers on the other. People in white hazmat suits will be silently monitoring these units, watching to make sure each organ grows properly. Harvesting of organs will take place within a certain length of time for optimum transplantability. What will happen to the organs that fail to grow just right? Will they be discarded into some kind of biohazardous waste dump or recycled somehow into cattle feed or cat food or the newest pot pie on the market? I'm not really sure I want to know but will keep my eyes open for more info on this as the technology develops.
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