The patient had late stage cancer in his trachea with a tumor that continued to grow. There was no suitable donor trachea available so the docs at Karolinska University Hospital in Huddinge, Stockholm, by Professor Paolo Macchiarini, of Karolinska University Hospital and Karolinska Institutet, and colleagues grew and implanted the world’s first artificial trachea for the patient. The cool part is that since the artificial trachea was made from his own cells there was no rejection and no immunosuppressive drugs were needed.

The synthetic scaffold was seeded with the donor stem cells and then grown inside a bio-reactor for two days before being implanted into the patient. So far, there have been no complications after the surgery. The team also thinks that this procedure would be particularly important in the care of children since donor tracheas for kids are rare.

[via ScienceDaily]

Apparently the cells on the stumps of a salamander “only” need to revert to a “less mature” state instead of a day 1 embryonic state to differentiate and turn into the cells that will make up the new limb. Dr. Elly Tanaka, one of the biologists behind the study, said that this bodes well for us, because it means that tissue regeneration is much more probable than previously thought. But this is future-future tech, and further studies are needed before any human tests will be performed. I recommend that Dr. Tanaka and her colleagues read this document, published in 1963, so that we may avoid having to deal with the likes of this:

*shivers* Dr. Tanaka, please conduct research on radioactive spiders as well. It’ll be fun I promise.

[via Wired via Neatorama]