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Partially revived pig organs could force a rethink of critical-care processes

Procedures used in life support and to preserve organs in deceased human donors might one day need to be re-evaluated in the wake of a study that restored some cell function in pigs one hour after death.
  1. Brendan Parent

    1. Brendan Parent is assistant professor and director of transplant ethics and policy research at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York University, New York, USA.

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A surgeon puts a plastic bag containing a kidney into a box while a patient is being operated on in the background

A transplant surgeon in Berlin prepares organs donated by a woman with brain death. Credit: Fabrizio Bensch/Reuters

In 2019, neuroscientists and other researchers used a network of pumps, heaters and filters to control the contents, flow and temperature of a solution in the brains of pigs. Remarkably, the perfusion system, called BrainEx, was able to restore certain structural and functional properties in the pigs’ brains — even though the animals had been decapitated for food production four hours before1.

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Nature 608, 32-35 (2022)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-02060-9

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Competing Interests

B.P. directs Transplant Ethics and Policy Research at NYU School of Medicine in the Division of Medical Ethics. This programme is in part funded by a gift from United Therapeutics Corporation.

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