EMERGING BIOTECH
Grow-Your-Own Organ — A New Hope Against Organ Failure
The Creative Lymph Node Solution Set to Redefine Organ Regeneration
Some can barely keep a succulent alive; personally, I mostly opt for fake IKEA plants.
But how about growing a liver?
While it may demand more nurturing, precision, and care than the green onion plants on my balcony, new organ growth certainly offers a more valuable crop.
Biotech firm LyGenesis recently made bold strides to combat liver failure by attempting to cultivate ‘mini livers’ in a patient’s lymph nodes. This innovative approach could potentially transform the practice of organ transplantation and liver disease treatment, offering new hope to thousands who face life-altering prognoses each year.
The Novel Procedure
On March 25, healthy liver cells from a donor were injected into a lymph node in the upper abdomen of a patient suffering from liver failure. This unconventional method — if successful — promised that within a few months, these cells would proliferate and convert the lymph node into a functional miniature liver, capable of performing essential blood-filtering duties that the failing liver can no longer manage.
Why start in lymph nodes?
Lymph nodes have a rich blood supply, are very abundant throughout the body, and play a crucial role in the immune system and waste filtration. These features make them ideal for supporting the growth and function of implanted liver cells, providing a less invasive alternative to traditional liver transplants while leveraging the body’s natural systems to combat liver failure.
Confronting the Organ Crisis
Liver disease is a glaring health crisis, causing over 2 million deaths annually worldwide (about 4% of all annual deaths). End-stage liver disease is characterized by severe scarring that impedes the liver’s ability to filter toxins, often leading to fatal complications such as severe infections or liver cancer. While liver transplants can save lives, the scarcity of available organs means that many patients die waiting for a suitable donor. Many succumb to this fate each year while on the transplant waiting list, and many more are too ill to undergo the procedure.
Recent Success, Future Prospects
LyGenesis’s approach may offer a promising alternative. By using donated liver cells that might otherwise be discarded, the procedure maximizes the potential of existing resources. The technical process involves delivering these cells through a tube inserted via the throat and injecting them into a lymph node near the liver.
In animal trials, the results were hopeful. Within two months of liver cell injection, the cells had grown into miniature livers with a cellular structure similar to that of a typical healthy liver. Remarkably, these mini livers could conduct functional bile transport without bile acid build-up, indicating functional processing capabilities.
Michael Hufford, CEO of LyGenesis, has been optimistic about the potential for these mini livers to stabilize patients’ conditions by responding to chemical distress signals from the failing liver. As these signals diminish, the growth of the mini livers is expected to cease, preventing any uncontrolled expansion.
Despite the promising outlook, experts like Stuart Forbes, a hepatologist at the University of Edinburgh, caution that mini livers may not address all complications of end-stage liver disease, such as portal hypertension.
This condition, caused by scar tissue compressing liver blood vessels, can lead to severe internal bleeding.
Nonetheless, the mini livers could still theoretically serve as a critical stopgap at this preliminary stage, keeping patients healthy enough to eventually receive a full liver transplant.
To the Liver and Beyond
LyGenesis’s ambitions extend beyond liver regeneration; their team is also exploring similar techniques to grow kidney and pancreas cells in animal lymph nodes. If the liver trials prove successful, future research might investigate using a patient’s own stem cells to generate liver cells, potentially eliminating the need for immunosuppressive drugs and creating personalized treatment options.
By potentially alleviating the organ shortage crisis and providing a lifeline to patients with no other treatment options, this innovative procedure could reshape the standard practices of organ transplantation and liver disease management.
Given that LyGenesis might soon figure out how to grow a vegetable garden assortment of organs, perhaps houseplants are worth a second try.
