Artificial organs

Spanish researchers have created a new potential treatment for age-related macular degeneration, which is currently untreatable – a biohybrid artificial retina, made of silk and loaded with new human cells that can integrate and repair the damage.

The human eye is incredibly complex, so it's very hard to reverse engineer. Now researchers have unveiled the world’s first 3D artificial eye, which can not only outperform other devices but has the potential to see better than the real thing.

Imagine needing a liver transplant and, instead of waiting for a donor, a new one could just be grown from your own skin cells. In a big step towards this, mini human livers grown from stem cells have been successfully transplanted into rats.

Researchers at MIT have developed a bionic heart to test heart valves and other cardiac implants under realistic conditions. Built out of an actual living heart, the new device promises improved designs and less expensive development cycles.

Scientists have pieced together 10 devices that mimic the functions of different organs to create a functioning Body-on-Chips platform, which can offer new and comprehensive insights into how prospective drugs will behave throughout the human body.

Organ development has traditionally been tricky to study, thanks largely to the difficulty in getting sensors in there without damaging the organs. Now, researchers from Harvard have developed a way to create “cyborg organoids” by integrating nanoelectronics into cell cultures.

The placenta may be one of the least understood organs, but it’s important to study its effects on the health of a developing fetus. Researchers at Iowa State University have used microfluidic models of the organ, a placenta-on-a-chip, to see if, and how much, caffeine can cross from mother to baby.

It's difficult to study how the heart reacts to diseases and medications. Researchers at Harvard have now grown a model of a human left ventricle that spontaneously beats, marking a substantial step towards engineering entire hearts for more accurate testing of new treatments.

The one artificial heart that's approved for human use in the US is only intended to keep patients going until they can get a heart transplant. A new device being developed by the Oregon Health & Science University, however, is designed to be a permanent fix.

Harvard has reported a breakthrough artificial eye just 30 microns in depth which can exceed the capabilities of the human eye. The technology could make a real impact in all manner of optical fields, including those in cameras, telescopes, microscopes, glasses and even virtual reality.

For the first time, scientists have successfully grown functioning human kidney tissue in the lab that is able to produce urine. The kidney tissue, generated from human stem cells, was implanted under the skin of mice and went on to develop into working kidney cells.

Researchers have used 3D-printing technology to produce individually-tailored model organs. These dummy organs could one day improve your chances of surviving surgery, by allowing doctors to plan and practice a lifesaving procedure on a realistic replica before putting you to the scalpel.