Printable Organs --Bio meets Kinkos

[Helix]

I happened along this article, and I don't know whether to be shocked or amazed:

 

http://www.avionnewspaper.com/media/paper798/news/2005/11/15/ScienceTech/BioPaper.Breakthrough.Enables.Printable.Organs-1058600.shtml?norewrite&sourcedomain=www.avionnewspaper.com

 

A new breakthrough in "bio-paper" called hydrogel could make this dream a reality. At the University of Utah, Professor of Medicinal Chemistry Glenn D. Prestwich has developed a revolutionary paper out of two sugar chains and reactive filler, a substance already being used to eliminate wrinkles in the face and to provide extra cushion in the knee.

 

The process of organ printing includes the use of Prestwich's hydrogel as the structure upon which to build the organs. Bio-ink will be mixed with a patient's own healthy cells in some type of print cartridge and then deposited in layers onto the hydrogel. The newly deposited layers will then be covered with hydrogel and the process will continue until the organ is created.

 

The breakthrough behind this is that the hydrogel acts as a structure and a network for the living cells to grow and expand upon. The hydrogel now makes it possible to create living tissue out of singly separated cells. The hope is to implement this technique in real time, possibly allowing doctors and surgeons to literally repair damaged organs with live tissue from the owner, eliminating the problem of organ rejection.

 

This seems to be quite an achievement for both biology and engineering, but will it work? Can organs be structured using cellular/bio-paper scaffolding? Would the "paper" provide sufficient support for the organ? And what about the various cells within an organ, how will the protocol know where to place each cell?

 

I believe that simple organs, such as skin, can be manufactured. Skin is complex, sure, but less than a brain. It is thin enough, also, to be printed without using thousands of the sheets of bio-paper scaffolding. Maybe hearts and livers can be printed out in the future. The idea of Xenotransplantation, putting animal organs into people, can be outright forgotten if this works.

 

This sounds like something out of a sci-fi book, but it seems to be true. My question is: will it work?

 

Arthur C. Clarke was right:

 

"If we have learned one thing from the history of invention and discovery, it is that, in the long run - and often in the short one - the most daring prophecies seem laughably conservative."

[zyncod]

It's possible. The 3-D structure of organs is the major stumbling block to growing organs. They'll still need to provide the intercellular signals in three dimensions, but this is a good way of starting.

 

I work in an orthopedic hospital, and they were looking at buying this machine that can make replacement hips by "printing them out." Essentially, the machine shines an electron beam at a layer of powdered metal, melting that layer into shape. It moves the platform up slightly, and "prints" out another layer. So you can make very complicated three-dimensional structures from, say, a CAD worksheet, without having to resort to casting the individual pieces (therefore, less breakage under heavy use and less places for biofilms to get a foothold).

[Helix]

That's really great; I didn't know similar technology existed. I heard, a while back in some HHMI article, that some scientist had figured out a way to make cellular scaffolding by injecting the materials into the body and then turning them on by shining a light on them. So, you could "turn on" the scaffolding from outside the body.

[Bluenoise]

Yep I've heard of this sounds really promissing, but I caution you this is very preliminary work. It will be a while till they get this right for many organs. The first thing you'll probably see this applicable with is bone.

 

Basically it uses something like an ink jet printer to spray thousands of layers of cells and matrix on top of each other to creat a 3d organ. This works like other 3d printers.

 

The idea is that the cells with grown and replace the matrix eventually giving a proper organ.

 

There are so many hurdles to overcome though I wont even get into it.

[rakuenso]

but don't the organs have to be customly tailored to prevent tissue rejection?

[Bluenoise]

He mentions that in the original post

[Deified]

but don't the organs have to be customly tailored to prevent tissue rejection?

 

The process uses live tissue from the patient. It's already custom tailored.

[Helix]

Yep I've heard of this sounds really promissing' date=' but I caution you this is very preliminary work. It will be a while till they get this right for many organs. The first thing you'll probably see this applicable with is bone.

 

Basically it uses something like an ink jet printer to spray thousands of layers of cells and matrix on top of each other to creat a 3d organ. This works like other 3d printers.

 

The idea is that the cells with grown and replace the matrix eventually giving a proper organ.

 

There are so many hurdles to overcome though I wont even get into it.

[/quote']

 

Your right, the work is preliminary but I'm still in awe it can even be done in theory. But I disagree with you about bone being the first thing primarily because bone is pretty complicated. B-cell producing sites and the various blood tissues would make bone a challenge. I think arteries will be the first because they are pretty simple.

 

Also, I read in another article that the way it prints makes tubes pretty easy to make (it prints in spirals). So blood vessels and arteries will probably be the first.

 

Skin might also be easier because it is relatively thin and wouldn't use so much scaffolding. But the neurons and glands would be tricky...

 

This technology is promising, with it you can print out pretty much anything 3D (even chairs and tables....new way of manufacturing) but it has many obstacles in its way.

[Bluenoise]

I was refering to bone as a structural device. Sorry I should have clarified that. There is already very good progress in that respect.

[Helix]

I was refering to bone as a structural device. Sorry I should have clarified that. There is already very good progress in that respect.

 

 

Ohh do you mean bone rather than bio-paper, let the cells grow in a bone base?

 

Or am I an idiot (Don't answer that... )?

[rakuenso]

how many different types of cells are responsible for an organ though? or is he using stem cells?

[Helix]

He isn't using stem cells, as far as I know, so each layer would have to have each cell type in its place I 'pose.

 

Stem cells would be easier though.

[TeenKing]

So it is basically stem cell paper. . put it in and let it grow?

 

*Chu chu chu chia!*

[Helix]

So it is basically stem cell paper. . put it in and let it grow?

 

*Chu chu chu chia!*

 

 

No, this is more "bio-paper." The ink is put on the paper and contains the cells and nutrients. The paper serves as scaffolding. It sounds simple but is very advanced; it is still mostly theoretical though these scientists have managed to make a prototype model.

[Max_Normal]

Actually this is a gel rather than a bio-paper. Printing cells onto paper will cause many problems as they have to be in an aqueus medium (to allow diffusion of molecules to the cell) that contains:-

 

A) A pH buffer to counteract the lactic acid buildup from cellular respiration.

B) Amino acids to facilitate the constant protein synthesis that cells need to survive

and

C) Growth factors (hormone-like signalling molecules) that constantly tell cells to divide, (MAPK signalling) investigate the other cells in their environment and keeps protein synthesis from shutting down (mTOR signalling). Usually supplied from blood serum from calf foetuses.

D) Glucose to facilitate respiration.

 

Therein lies the problem, with no immediate vascularisation (blood vessels with flowing blood) to provide the above mentioned conditions, cells with rapidly die. This is why if you let a cell culture grow more than 2 or 3 cells thick, they start to die off - they simply don't get enough access to the nutrients.

 

This is why we do not have synthetically grown organs (or steaks, yum! fetal calf serum flavoured) already.

 

It's a fantastic idea, but far more advanced than current cell culture technology. If you could incorporate a blood capilliary network into the tissue as it was printed, and rapidly hook it up to a blood or tissue culture medium supply, you'd be on to a winner. Until then, no go.

 

Bear in mind also that tissue culture has no immune system, so all of this has to be done under absolutely sterile conditions. Very hard indeed.

[cellster]

I work at the University of Utah and the work done by Dr. Prestwich was highlighted a couple of months ago in an article. There is actually a company making and selling the gel Dr. Prestwich was talking about. The website is http://www.glycosan.com. They aren't very close to really doing much with organ printing-right now they're using it for 3-D cell culture- but in the future they have plans to do something of the sorts. Supposedly, this gel can be used for all sorts of stuff right now, like: cell culture, angiogenesis assays, chemoinvasion assays, etc. It'll be neat to see if they do anything with the organ printing. I've heard that they've actually already done the organ printing thing with a bladder and actually transplanted it into a person. I can't remember the source, however, so maybe I'm not remembering that correctly.