Potentially ground-breaking research as scientists bring back deceased pigs' cells and organs
The research seems to represent a turning point for the transplantation of human organs, bringing up new avenues and opportunities.
A team of researchers was able to revive pigs that had been dead for an hour in the most recent study, which could alter how we define death going forward. In certain organs, they also succeeded in regaining cell function.
Researchers from Yale University claimed that they employed cutting-edge technology to restore cells and bring the animals’ cells back to life in a study that was published on Wednesday, August 3 in the academic journal Nature.
David Andrijevic, an associate research scientist in neuroscience at Yale School of Medicine and co-lead author of the study, said, “All cells do not die immediately, there is a more protracted series of events. It is a process in which you can intervene, stop, and restore some cellular function.”
Brendan Parent, an assistant professor of bioethics at the NYU Grossman School of Medicine, was left stunned. As quoted by NBC News, Parent said, “My brain went to all the crazy places we could go in 20 or 30 years.”
Parent was not involved in the study.
The research seems to represent a turning point for the transplantation of human organs, bringing up new avenues and opportunities. The researcher’s technology might prolong the life of organs even after death. For many millions of people around the world, it might be a blessing.
Earlier in 2019, a US-based team was able to revive cells in pigs’ brains hours after they had been severed from their heads.
The same methodology employed in 2019 was expanded to include the full body in the most recent study by the researchers. They gave the anaesthetized pigs a heart attack to conduct the study. They used the procedure once the blood stopped flowing through the bodies.
The carcasses of dead pigs were pumped with a liquid that contained their own blood, a synthetic version of haemoglobin, and medications that shield cells and prevent blood clots. The protein in red blood cells that carries oxygen is called haemoglobin.
For the following six hours of the experiment, blood began to circulate once more, and numerous cells, including those in the heart, liver, and kidney, started to function.
Nenad Sestan, the study’s senior author and a researcher at Yale University, told journalists: “These cells were functioning hours after they should not have been — what this tells us is that the demise of cells can be halted.”
Parvathy Sukumaran 
