By Leilani Gao '26
Where there are more organs needed than those that are available, Xenotransplantation serves as an alternate means to use non-human cells, tissues, or organs to treat medical conditions.¹ Specifically, recent breakthroughs have been made where genetically modified pig organs have the potential to save lives.
Pig hearts and kidneys have similar functions to humans. At NYU Langone Health, the latest experiment notes that even in patients on ventilators who no longer have proper neurological functions, kidney transplants from pigs remain stable in the human body and continue to maintain stable bodily functions such as urinary filtration.²
In the University of Maryland, surgeons have recently transplanted a pig’s heart into a man with terminal heart disease. Dr. Muhammad Mohiuddin was involved in this process, and he wants this research to become open to the public, so more people will understand the concept of xenotransplantation. Dr. Mohiuddin’s hope is that people will not be shocked at the ideas and experiments of xenotransplantation, where a deceased body is able to mimic that of a live patient’s reactions to a pig organ.²
More than 100,000 patients are on the nation’s transplant list and thousands die each year waiting. Researchers use pigs, as primate organs carry the risk of infectious diseases. Furthermore there are ethical concerns on using human organs which can influence the decisions of those who need treatment. On the other hand, pig organs are similar sizes and are an effective human-organ alternative. Pork is also a common food source in our everyday lives, so there is less of an ethical concern. Even before pig organ transplantation, tissues and hormones from pigs have been used for years in the medical sector for heart valves, insulin, and hormones.¹
Genetically altering the makeup of a pig has become much easier and quicker using clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR). CRISPR has been increasingly incorporated into research by scientists, and was recently used in the genetic modification of pig organs, allowing for selective changes to be made in the DNA of these living organisms.³
Safety, however, can be a big issue for CRISPR as there can be off-target mutations which can lead to unintended modifications. Specifically, mistakes can occur involving tumor suppressor genes, or oncogenes, leading to the development of cancer.
Despite safety concerns of CRISPR, it has allowed for the removal of the porcine endogenous retrovirus (PERV) gene that has made altering the genome of pigs quite challenging e for many decades This has allowed for the generation of viable organ donor pigs, simultaneously reducing the risks of transmitting infectious diseases– a step forward in making xenotransplantation a practical medical procedure.³
Even through it has only been in recent years that the science of xenotransplantation has improved through gene editing and cloning technologies, significant advancement in the field with the aid of CRISPR has brought forth a viable technique to make animal organs less likely to be rejected by the human immune system.
Xenotransplantation serves as a promising avenue for battling our organ shortage crisis. By revolutionizing organ transplantation, xenotransplantation has the potential to open the door for donor animals, reducing the wait time to acquire organs while offering the opportunity to save countless lives.
Associated Press. (2023, August 16). Pig kidney works in a brain-dead man for over a month, a step toward animal-human transplants. NBC News. Retrieved October 6, 2023, from https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/pig-kidney-transplant-human-rcna100098
Rabin, R. C. (2023, September 22). Genetically modified pig's heart is transplanted into a second patient. New York Times. Retrieved October 6, 2023, from https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/22/health/pig-heart-transplant-faucette.html
The Jackson Labratory Authors. (n.d.). What is CRISPR? The Jackson Labratory. Retrieved October 6, 2023, from https://www.jax.org/personalized-medicine/precision-medicine-and-you/what-is-crispr
National Kidney Foundation Authors. (n.d.). Xenotransplantation. National Kidney Foundation. Retrieved October 6, 2023, from https://www.kidney.org/atoz/content/xenotransplantation
Health Matters Authors. (n.d.). How xenotransplantation works. New York Prebyterian. Retrieved October 6, 2023, from https://healthmatters.nyp.org/how-xenotransplantation-works/
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