The Yale team partially revives dead pig organs one hour after death

A technology developed by Yale called OrganEx was used to partially revive the organs of dead pigs an hour after their hearts stopped beating – an achievement that could have major implications for people in need of organ donation.

“Things are not as dead as we previously thought,” researcher Zvonimir Vrselja told BBC News. “We have shown that we can actually initiate cell repair at the molecular level. We can convince cells not to die.”

The challenge: When the heart stops beating, the body loses its steady supply of oxygenated blood. Within minutes, organs begin to swell, causing blood vessels to collapse and blood flow to be cut off, and cells throughout the body begin to die.

These events mean that transplant surgeons must act quickly to harvest organs from a donor as soon as their heart stops. If too much time passes, the damage becomes too severe and irreversible, and the organs are no longer viable for transplantation.

The study: OrganEx could potentially buy transplant surgeons more time by keeping organs viable longer.

The system consists of two main parts. The first is an experimental fluid that suppresses inflammation and disrupts the processes that lead to cell death. The second is a device that pumps the fluid through the body.

“It was difficult to tell the difference between a healthy organ and one treated with OrganEx.”

Zvonimir Vrselja

For their study, the Yale team stunned pigs and then induced cardiac arrest by shocking the animals’ hearts. They then waited an hour before treating some of the dead pigs with OrganEx and some with ECMO – a machine that provides heart and lung support to critically ill people.

The researchers then monitored the animals for six hours before dissecting and examining their organs.

The results: The ECMO-treated pigs showed all the usual signs of cardiac death, including organ swelling and collapsed blood vessels.

Meanwhile, dead pigs treated with OrganEx showed restored organ function. The researchers saw evidence of electrical activity in their hearts, their circulation was restored, and important cellular functions were taking place in their livers, kidneys and other parts of the body.

“Under the microscope, it was difficult to tell the difference between a healthy organ and one treated with OrganEx technology after death,” Vrselja said.

Curiously, the pigs also appeared to have regained some motor function – at one point during the experiment they spontaneously and involuntarily jerked their heads.

“It was pretty startling for the people in the room,” study co-author Stephen Latham told reporters.

Looking ahead: In the US, 17 people die every day because they needed a new organ and one wasn’t available. If OrganEx can do the same thing in humans as it does in dead pigs, it could potentially increase the number of viable transplant organs and save countless lives.

However, much more research is needed before the technology can even be tested on human cadavers, and even then researchers need to address the ethical questions OrganEx raises about life, death and consent to organ donation.

“If you’re doing this with people, it’s really important that people are told not just that they’re volunteering to have their organs transplanted, but that their bodies will be kept alive for an indefinite period of time to participate in that transplant.” help. Hank Greely, a Stanford law and ethics professor, told MIT Technology Review.

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