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posted by cmn32480 on Thursday November 24 2016, @03:27AM   Printer-friendly
from the making-your-innards-from-the-outards dept.

If you think 3D printing is limited to plastic gizmos, wait until you see what a team at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center has managed to do.

The team has been studying ways to get a human analog model for the rare condition called Hirschsprung's disease. They were able to make stem cells evolve to intestinal cells, then inject them at the right moment into other stem cells that have been treated to be nerve precursors. This resulted in both types of cells creating a complex structure that was very close to a human intestine.

The final result was then transplanted into mice with suppressed immune systems to confirm that it would perform correctly, displaying bowel movements and processing nutrients.

This proves that we can now create more complex organs, not only to study diseases, but also to test if drugs have any effect on human digestive tracts. This is also the first step to be able to "print" part of an intestinal tract system for people that need them. As they would be coming from stem cells, these type of transplants are the holy grail of medicine because they would not trigger an immune system response.

https://www.cincinnatichildrens.org/news/release/2016/hirschsprungs-intestinal-nerve-disorder

Original Study


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @06:59AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @06:59AM (#432313)

    In 50 years there should be a system that scans the human body, identifies any problems, and excises and replaces tissue as needed. All in one visit.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @09:19AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @09:19AM (#432338)

    Robots taking all the jobs...

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @02:40PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @02:40PM (#432396)

    Hey!! I'm happy to have that cancer removed, but the damn machine took my beauty mole too!

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @09:09PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 24 2016, @09:09PM (#432595)

      Hey!! I'm happy to have my bowel rebuilt, but the damn machine took my gerbil too!