Stem cells fill in for liver in mouse experiment

[deadparrot]

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Stem cells grown from mouse embryos helped power a liver replacement device, Japanese and U.S. researchers reported on Sunday.

Their experiment suggests another use for the cells, controversial when taken from human embryos. They used the cells in a bioartificial liver, an implanted device that uses liver cells to replace some liver function.

Writing in the journal Nature Biotechnology, Ira Fox of the University of Nebraska Medical Center, Naoya Kobayashi of Okayama University in Japan and others said their cells saved the lives of mice that otherwise would have died of liver failure.

"Use of this device in mice with acute liver failure, which uniformly die within 4 days of inducing hepatic (liver) failure, resulted in 90 percent long-term animal survival," they wrote.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061105/sc_nm/science_stemcells_dc

[Mythsaje]

1. Wow...

This is important!

Beautiful.

[tanstaafl]

2. Better yet ...

Better yet stem cell based "organs" could be used for drug / product testing an eliminate the need to test on live mice / rabbits / primates. I imagine the animal "pro-life" people will/would be quite pleased if this could happen.

[ms liberty]

3. Woa - That's very Heinlein, isn't it?

Now if they could get it to grow a new liver, that would be the ideal solution...but this is pretty cool too!

[Harper_is_Bush]

4. kicked and RECOMMENDED. nt

[Vidar]

5. Applauding the researchers.

[Akoto]

6. Wow. Ninety percent.

That's quite a success rate. Very cool.