for all those people that think that we can grow a heart in vitro any time soon:

Nature 421, 884 - 886 (2003)

Tissue engineering: The beat goes on

some quotes:
Perhaps it was just millennial hubris, but in 1999 the world seemed full of enthusiasm for science and technology. The NASDAQ high-tech stock market was booming; the Human Genome Project was racing towards completion. And one group of scientists was talking up a plan to grow a fully functioning heart in the lab, starting with a culture of human cells in a petri dish. All they needed was ten years, plus about US$5 billion, and our worries about the shortage of organ donors would be over.

The initiative, known as Living Implants from Engineering (LIFE), would rival the Human Genome Project in scale and in its potential to change medical practice. But four years later, LIFE has lost its lustre. The grand project remains largely unfunded, and functions mainly as a loose coalition of researchers who share their findings at meetings. "LIFE collapsed into the form of a club," admits its chief visionary, Michael Sefton of the University of Toronto in Canada."


"In retrospect, Sefton concedes that LIFE's ten-year timescale was unrealistic. "We were trying to capture the attention of the public," he admits. He now thinks that it may be 25 years before a patient receives a lab-grown heart, and refuses to speculate on the price tag. But he is still pursuing funding, and remains convinced that the project could produce tangible results within ten years. "We could probably have something that could work crudely," Sefton claims. "Not something ready to transplant into patients, but something you could hold in your hand."


and those 25 years is probably bullshit

it would be far easier to genetically engineer pigs so that their organs won't get rejected in a human, then to grow up a heart by its own. Which is why there are at least two companies persuing this transgenic pig idea.

I Think it would be easier to use a stem cell vat to produce the cells needed for the heart. Then use nano tech to modify the cells. Then assemble it. Bingo you have a new heart off the assembly line in 2 weeks. Customized to meet the genetic requirements of the patient.

Well we can always hope on xenotransplantation. The organs are grown, the only problem now is getting the rejection rate as low as humans. Also the idea of eating a slice of ham that they may have got there heart from may bother some people... so its best to switch to goats :D

As for a human heart grown in vitro, I feel that the only problem is money.

if you read the article you would have noticed that originally they claimed it could be done in 10 years with 5 billion US$!!!!

now the guy claims (not a skeptic, but an optimist!!!) 25 years and he refuses to name an amount.

wake up...he is full of shit. It is not the money that matters, he is trying to change his position without losing too much face.

25 years in biological research...can you imagine that? do you know what the field was like 25 years ago? we just starting cloning a bit on a regular basis and PCR was probably not even there yet. And he claims it will take 25 years. This claim is therefore an empty claim. Nobody knows what happens in 25 years in biological research

Oh I thought you were being pessimistic and hopeless about tissue-engineering like you always were?

Oh I’m referring to you belief that organs will take a eternity to grow… In vivo they can grow reasonably fast (9 months to fully formed though not adult sized) How can you say it is not impossible to grow them equally as fast or faster in vitro? That is if of course we developed a way to give them proper blood flow, nutrienation and oxygenation. Huuum we would need a artificial womb with pumps supply blood to the synthetic uterine tissue and passing by dialysis, nutrient injectors and oxygenating systems… basically a device that can replace women on a purely reproductive scale, hey we could have replace men years ago with sperm backs and testacies kept alive in a jar, so its only fair a similar setup is made to threaten women!

if you think so...

the problem lies in that building the heart out of cells is so much more difficult then to get cells to automatically grow into a cell. However triggering the cells to do that, and providing them the right enviroment seems to be the major problem.

Originally posted by WellCookedFetus
Oh I thought you were being pessimistic and hopeless about tissue-engineering like you always were?

Oh I’m referring to you belief that organs will take a eternity to grow… In vivo they can grow reasonably fast (9 months to fully formed though not adult sized) How can you say it is not impossible to grow them equally as fast or faster in vitro? That is if of course we developed a way to give them proper blood flow, nutrienation and oxygenation. Huuum we would need a artificial womb with pumps supply blood to the synthetic uterine tissue and passing by dialysis, nutrient injectors and oxygenating systems… basically a device that can replace women on a purely reproductive scale, hey we could have replace men years ago with sperm backs and testacies kept alive in a jar, so its only fair a similar setup is made to threaten women!


1. I used to say it..and i have first hand experience with tissue culture and stem cells.

2. Now the biggest proponent of tissue engineering has admitted it can't be done for 5 BILLION $ and in 10 years.

3. no such thing as an artifical womb etc exists at present or will in the near future.

Why do you think it won't in the future?

that kind of future is science fiction...

Ooh and why is it fictional (not possible)?

As you can see for from one of my post above it would be needed for growing organs at a reasonable speed and thickness (you are totally aware of why tissue can only be grown as now in thin membranes), so there is incentive for such a device.

Then again perhaps we could engineer animals with lacking immunity qualities so that we can implant the stem cells in them and grow human organs in there bodies… a kind of half way mark between xenotransplantation and tissue engineering.

yes ok fetus...this expert says it can't be done, but you know better...we get it now.

Why do you think it immpossible? I just don't get that, what is there that say its impossible?

not getting into whether or not it is possible, but why would you want to?

it is not impossible to shift a planet out of its orbit, but is it feasible?

I believe it is feasible to make in vitro organs... it how we do it and which way will be most effective, that’s the issue.

Originally posted by WellCookedFetus
I believe it is feasible to make in vitro organs... it how we do it and which way will be most effective, that’s the issue.

you should start working for a biotech company interested in tissue engineering. They need you.

And you still have not explain why it is not.

Originally posted by WellCookedFetus
And you still have not explain why it is not.


i dunno...do you know anything about developmental biology, organogenesis, morphogenesis?

Well then if you don't know why it is not possible to grow organs in vitro then you’re not in a position to say so. As for my credentials that has no relevance to what your saying.

i suppose a very talented group of tissue engineers might be able to do such a thing but it seems difficult. *remembering bits and pieces from embryology*: let's see now, the formation of structures in the body depends on the cells surrounding it. there would be programmed apoptosis to form the shape of the organ. i dunno, from as much as i know about the whole thing (not too much), i looks like you'd have to grow the whole damn body to get an organ. can somebody explain organogenesis before my head explodes?

in imaginal discs, development of wings depends a great deal on morphogen flow from the base of the disc coming from the body of the fly and back again. how can you possibly control all the proteins and morphogens in vitro?

The idea is (as of now) to grow the tissues and then assemble the organ from it manually. For organs and tissues like balder, skin, cartilage, bone that’s been done but lungs and kidney... well were going to need etched and pattern silicon plates and layering and the resulting organs going to be made like a 3d computer chip. Probably not easy nor will it look like the real thing but hopefully will function like it.

i gave you my reasons...you just disregard them.

your assumptions are just not realistic.

to grow a tissue is on a different level than growing an organ.

And why are they not realistic? We can't put tissues together and make a organ?

ask the guy from the article...he is the expert...