Experts used similar approach already employed to produce bioengineered parts of hearts, lungs and livers
Stripped living cells from donor organs with a detergent solution
Then, organs were cultured for up to 12 days in a 'bioreactor'
Scientists have managed to bring a dead kidney back to life.
The breakthrough could lead to patients growing their own replacement kidney, rather than relying on a donor.
Kidney patients account for 90 per cent of people on the transplant waiting list.
But with a three-year wait for a donor, more than 350 men, women and children die each year while doctors are searching for a suitable organ.
Now, thanks to the development, patients could one day be offered a ‘made-to-order’ kidney.
The US research team – from Massachusetts General Hospital – took a kidney from a dead rat, stripped away the tissue, coated it with new cells and transplanted it into a living animal.
In less than two weeks the cells had spread across the framework, providing it with a blood supply.
And, when the kidney was transplanted into the rat, it started to work and even produced urine. Researcher Harald Ott said: ‘We hope bioengineered kidneys will someday be able to fully replace kidney function, just as donor kidneys do.
‘In an ideal world, grafts would be produced on demand from a patient’s own cells.’
Dr Ott, who has already grown a beating heart in his laboratory, said: ‘If this can be scaled to human-sized grafts, patients suffering from renal failure could theoretically receive new organs derived from their own cells.’
A video accompanying the article, which was published in Nature Medicine, says: ‘If Dr Frankenstein were real and alive today, he’d probably want to stop by the Massachusetts General Hospital.
‘Here, scientists are harvesting dead organs and returning them to life.
‘But instead of giant green monsters, these researchers are creating hearts, lungs, limbs and kidneys that could one day be used to replace failing organs in people.’
Elaine Davies, of Kidney Research UK, said the work offered ‘new hope for patients’.
‘This offers new hope for patients’
Laboratory tests showed that the constructed kidneys were able to filter blood and produce urine.
Transplanted into living rats, they continued to produce urine with no evidence of bleeding or clot formation.
Study leader Dr Harald Ott, from Massachusetts General Hospital, whose work is reported in the journal Nature Medicine, said: 'What is unique about this approach is that the native organ's architecture is preserved, so that the resulting graft can be transplanted just like a donor kidney and connected to the recipient's vascular and urinary systems.
'If this technology can be scaled to human-sized grafts, patients suffering from renal failure who are currently waiting for donor kidneys or who are not transplant candidates could theoretically receive new organs derived from their own cells.'
The scientists have made a start to applying the technology at larger scales by stripping cells from pig and human kidneys.
In rats, the performance of the regenerated organs was significantly lower than that of normal, healthy kidneys. This could be due to the immaturity of the newborn cells used to repopulate the organ scaffolding, the researchers believe.
Further refinement of the cell types used for seeding and additional maturation in culture may allow us to achieve a more functional organ,' said Dr Ott.
'Based on this initial proof of principle, we hope that bioengineered kidneys will someday be able to fully replace kidney function just as donor kidneys do.
'In an ideal world, such grafts could be produced 'on demand' from a patient's own cells, helping us overcome both the organ shortage and the need for chronic immunosuppression.
'We're now investigating methods of deriving the necessary cell types from patient-derived cells and refining the cell-seeding and organ culture methods to handle human-sized organs.'
Demand for transplant kidneys in the UK is far higher than the available supply of donated organs, both living and dead.
Between April 2010 and April 2011 a total of 1,020 living kidney donations were made, and 1,667 organs were taken from recently deceased people. But this still left just under 7,000 people on the waiting list for a donation.
People can survive happily with just one kidney, but kidney failure affecting both organs.
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