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Corneas Could Be the First Mainstream Application of Bioprinting (ieee.org)
A startup says it can replace donated eyes with 3D-printed corneas. From a report: Here's a futuristic problem that may not have occurred to you: If self-driving cars really catch on and the number of traffic fatalities plunges, so will the number of organs available for transplant. Currently, about 20 percent of donated organs come from people who die in car accidents. Luckily, there's a futuristic solution: 3D-printed organs.
This technology is far from ready for the clinic, as researchers are still trying to figure out how to print out complex tissue structures with blood vessels and nerves. But for one early indicator of progress in this field, look to the eye. Precise Bio, a North Carolina-based startup founded by several professors at the renowned Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, is working on bioprinting tissues for a variety of medical applications. The company just announced that its first products will be for the eye -- starting with a human cornea suitable for transplantation. "We plan to put our printers in eye banks," says Precise Bio CEO Aryeh Batt.
This technology is far from ready for the clinic, as researchers are still trying to figure out how to print out complex tissue structures with blood vessels and nerves. But for one early indicator of progress in this field, look to the eye. Precise Bio, a North Carolina-based startup founded by several professors at the renowned Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, is working on bioprinting tissues for a variety of medical applications. The company just announced that its first products will be for the eye -- starting with a human cornea suitable for transplantation. "We plan to put our printers in eye banks," says Precise Bio CEO Aryeh Batt.
"If self-driving cars really catch on and the number of traffic fatalities plunges, so will the number of organs available for transplant."
Hilarious.
The assumption is that there will be a shortage of traffic fatality-induced body parts. I propose that we'll make up for that as we Americans slaughter each other over trivial opinions and political differences. Obviously I have more faith in the power of the Iranians, N. Koreans, Russians and Chinese to push hot buttons via social media than I do in the ability of Americans to tell when they're being manipulated. sigh.
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
while it is far from something that you can actually implant into a patient in need of organ transplant, current state of the art is already able to build "organoid":
small structered 3D cell cultures that more or less mimic on a tiny scale some of the structures found in real life natural organs.
These are already useful at this stage for research (mostly pharma as they help investigate better the effects of potential drugs on interacting functional tissues, rather than cells floating freely in a test tube).
i.e.: we're already halfway there, and this halfway is already useful (though it's more "a few percent down the right direction" rather than litteraly *half*way)
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
For those of us with degenerative a corneal disease, this sounds pretty wonderful.
Of course, the cost will be exorbitant and perpetually 10 years away...
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"I only do eyes!"
"Here's a futuristic problem that may not have occurred to you: If self-driving cars really catch on and the number of traffic fatalities plunges, so will the number of organs available for transplant."
The bikers will save us. Perhaps not the liver and lungs, but hey, it's a start.
"If you could only see what I've seen w/ YOUR eyes..." - Roy Batty Bladrunner ("I've fought starships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched 'C-beams' glitter @ the Tannhauser Gate...")
APK
P.S.=> Great film & good post on your end... apk
What about an entire bionic eye? It could have zooming so as to check out attractive people from a distance. (There may also be dignified societal benefits, but right now I can only think about how it satisfies basal instincts.)
In the future the input device and screen projection could be done with head implants. Just don't freak people out going around saying, "resistance is futile". Extra un-points if done in a Dalek voice.
Such tech may be pioneered on vision-impaired and RSI patients.
Table-ized A.I.
Just start passing the death penalty for all sort of crimes, with the convict being disassembled for parts. What could go wrong?
Pay me for the body parts in advance, and you can have them when I'm gone. .... shortage disappears.
Poof !
No, you cannot have them for free.
this will be a boon for those with ocular TB
From the article: "these layers don’t contain blood vessels or nerves". As someone who suffers from corneal neuralgia I can tell you with considerable certainty that the cornea does contains nerves. In fact it is one of the most sensitive parts of the body. Go ahead hold your eye open and touch your finger to your cornea. Do you feel that? Nerves!
See what I did there?
we all KNOW its going to be dongs.
The most ethical thing to do is grow human[oid]s minus the frontal cortex to serve as organ farms. Anything less is a waste of time and money.
...
The solution is to enact the death penalty for bank overdrafts, jaywalking, making fun of creimer, etc...
Though China is trying it (and Clinton tried something similar when governor of Arkansas), we haven't gotten the "Organ Bank Problem" of Niven's "Known Space" series for a simple list of reasons:
- AIDS
- Hepatitis
- Alzheimers
- CJD
and so on.
People in jail, as a result of drug use and other factors, are a population often infected with difficult diseases that would be transplanted along with thane organ. The risk is far too high, and testing has far too many false negatives..
So transplants are from donors, and research into cultured replacement parts is well funded and starting to produce good results.
Some is already in use. Example: the replacement skin technology for burn victims developed by the Shriner's hospitals.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
What about an entire bionic eye? It could have zooming ...
I'll be happy to settle for a lens that flexes like mine did in my youth, so I can autofocus again, and replacement corneas if/when mine become darkened or cataract ridden.
Especially if they're of a curvature that doesn't require 6.5 diopters of spherical and 1.5 of crossed-cylinder correction perched on my nose.
Also: Biology gets REALLY CLOSE to getting the lens and cornea shapes right, but a cultured replacement, like some experimental lasic surgery, can be substantially better. 20/20 is for pikers. I had 20/10 in my teens with unaltered (though corrected) natural eyes. Lasic can go farther (though I didn't find how much farther in a cursory web search).
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
If it's safe would it be possible to replace a contact lense with a modified cornea? Something like that safer than laser surgery.
"Consensus" in science is _always_ a political construct.