Space might be the perfect place to grow human organs – Popular Science
By daniellenierenberg
Three-dimensional printers have now assembled candy, clothing, and even mouse ovaries. But in the next decade, specialized bioprinters could begin to build functioning human organs in space. It turns out, the minimal gravity conditions in space may provide a more ideal environment for building organs than gravity-heavy Earth.
If successful, space-printed organs could help to shorten transplant waitlists and even eliminate organ rejection. Though they still have a long way to go, researchers at the International Space Station (ISS) hope to eventually assemble organs from adult human cells, including stem cells.
The medical field has only recently embraced 3D printing in general, particularly in biomedical fields like regenerative medicine and prosthetics. So far, these printers have produced early versions of blood vessels, bones, and different types of living tissue by churning out repeated layers of bioinka substance comprised of living human cells and other tissue thats meant to mimic the natural environment that surrounds growing organs.
Recently, researchers are finding that Earth might not be the best environment for growing freestanding organs. Because gravity is constantly pushing down on these delicate structures as they grow, researchers must surround the tissues in scaffolding, which can often debilitate the delicate veins and blood vessels and prevent the soon-to-be organs from growing and functioning properly. Within microgravity, however, soft tissues hold their shape naturally, without the need for surrounding supportan observation thats driven researchers to space.
And one manufacturing lab based in Indiana thinks its tech could play a key role in space. The 3D BioFabrication Facility (BFF) is a specialized 3D printer that uses bioink to build layers several times thinner than human hair. It cost about $7 million to build and employs the smallest print tips in existence.
The brainchild of spaceflight equipment developer Techshot and 3D printer manufacturer nScrypt, the BFF headed to the ISS in July 2019 aboard the SpaceX CRS-18.
Currently, the project focuses on building increasingly thick artificial cardiac tissue and delivering it back to Earth. Once the printed cardiac tissue reaches a certain thickness, it gets harder for researchers to ensure that a printed structures layers effectively grow into one another. Ultimately, though, theyd like the organs to arrive here fully formed.
Printed organs would eventually require vasculature and nerve endings to work properly, though that technology doesnt yet exist.
The next stagetesting heart patches under microscopes and within animalscould span over the next four years. As for whole organs, Techshot claims it plans to begin production after 2025. For now, the project is still in its infancy.
If you were to look at what we printed, it looks very modest, says Techshot vice president of corporate advancement Rich Boling. Its just a cuboid-type shape, this rectangular box. Were just trying to get cells to grow one layer into the next.
Cooking organs like pancakes
Compare the manufacturing process to cooking pancakes, Boling says. The space crew first creates a custom bioink pancake mix with the cells sent from Earth, which they load with syringe-like tools into the BFF.
Researchers then insert a cassette into the BFF containing a bioreactora system that mimics the normal bodily functions essential for growing healthy tissue, like providing nutrients and flushing out waste.
Approximately 200 miles below in Greenville, Indiana, Techshot engineers connect with ISS astronauts on a NASA-enabled secure digital pathway. The linkup allows Techshot to remotely command BFF functions like pump pressure, internal temperature, lighting, and print speed.
Next, the actual printing process occurs within the bioreactor and can take anywhere from moments to hours, depending on the shapes complexity. In the final production step, the cell-culturing ADvanced Space Experiment Processor (ADSEP) cooks the theoretical pancake; essentially, the ADSEP toughens up the printed tissue for its journey back to earth. This step could take anywhere from 12 to 45 days for different tissue types. When completed and hardened, the structure heads home.
The researchers have gone through three testing processes so far, each one getting more exact. This March, theyll begin the third round of experiments.
The bioprinter space race
The BFF lab is the sole team developing this specific type of microgravity bioprinter, Boling says. Theyre not the only ones looking to print human organs in space, though.
A Russian project has also entered the bioprinting space race, however their technique highly differs. Unlike the BFFs bioink layering method, Russian biotechnology laboratory 3D Bioprinting Solutions uses magnetic nanoparticles to produce tissue. An electromagnet creates a magnetic field in which levitating tissue forms the desired structuretechnology that appears ripped from the pages of a sci-fi novel.
After their bioprinter fell victim to an October 2018 spacecraft crash, 3D Bioprinting Solutions rebounded; the team now collaborates with US and Israeli researchers at the ISS. Last month, their crew created the first space-bioprinted bone tissue. Similar to the US project, 3D Bioprinting Solutions aims to manufacture functioning human tissues and organs for transplantation and general repair.
Just because we have the technology to do it, should we do it?
If the 3D BioFabrication Facility prospers in printing working human organs, theyd be subject to thorough regulation here on Earth. The US approval process is stringent for any drug, Rich Boling says, posing a challenge for this unprecedented invention. Techshot predicts at least 10 years for space-printed organs to achieve legal approval, though its an inexact estimate.
Along with regulatory acceptance, human tissue printed in microgravity may encounter societal pushback.
Each country maintains varying laws related to medical transplants. Yet as bioengineering advances into the the final frontier, the international scientific research community may need to shape new guidelines for collaboration among the stars.
As the commercialization of low-Earth orbit continues to ramp up in the next few years, it is certainly true that were going to have to take a very close look at the regulations that apply to that, says International Space Station U.S. National Laboratory interim chief scientist Michael Roberts. And some of those regulations are going to stray into questions related to ethics: Just because we have the technology to do it, should we do it?
Niki Vermeulen, a University of Edinburgh science technology and innovation studies lecturer, has researched the social implications of 3D bioprinting experiments. Like any Earth-bound project, she urges scientists not to get peoples hopes up too early in the process; individuals seeking organ transplants could read about the BFF online and think it could soon be ready to meet their needs.
The most important thing now, I think, is expectation management, Vermeulen says. Because its really quite difficult to do this, and of course we really dont know if its going to work. If it did, it would be amazing.
Another main issue is cost. Like other cutting-edge biotechnology innovations, the organs could also pose a major affordability challenge, she says. Techshot claims that a single space-printed organ could actually cost less than one from a human donor, since some people must pay for a lifetime of anti-rejection meds and/or multiple transplants. Theres currently no telling how long the BFF process would actually take, however, compared to the conventional donor route.
Plus, theres potential health risks for recipients: Techshot chief scientist Eugene Boland says cell manipulation always presents a possibility of genetic mutation. Modified stem cells can potentially cause cancer in recipients, for example.
The team is now working to define and minimize any dangers, he says. The BFF experiment adheres to the FDAs specific regulations for human cells, tissues, and cellular and tissue-based products.
Researchers on the ground now hope to perfect human cell manipulation: Over 100 US clinical trials presently test cultured autologous human cells, and several hundred test cultured stem cells with multiple origins.
What comes next
After the next round of printing tests this March, Techshot will share the bioprinter with companies and research institutions looking to print materials like cartilage, bone, and liver tissue. Theyre currently preparing the bioprinter for these additional uses, Boling says, which could advance health care as a whole.
To speed things up for space crews, Techshot is now building a cell factory that produces multiple cell types in orbit. This technology could cut down the number of cell deliveries between Earth and space.
The ISS has taken in plenty of commercial ventures in recent years, Michael Roberts says, and its getting crowded up there. Space-based experiments ramped up between 40 and 50 years ago, though until recently they mostly prioritized satellite communications and remote observation technology. Since then, satellites have shrunk from bus-sized to smaller than a shoebox.
Roberts has witnessed the scientific areas of interest broaden over the past decade to include medicine. Organizations like the National Institutes of Health are now looking to space to improve treatments, and everything from large pharmaceutical companies to small-scale startups want in.
Theyve got something stuck on every surface up there, he says.
As the ISS runs out of space and exterior attachment points, Roberts predicts that commercial ventures will build new facilities built for specific activities like manufacturing and plant growth. He sees it as a good opportunity for further innovation, since the ISS was originally designed for far more general purposes.
Space, as a whole, may start to look quite different from the first exploration age.
Baby boomers may remember glimpsing at a grainy, black-and-white moon landing five decades ago. Within the same lifetime, they could potentially observe the introduction of space-printed organs.
Read more:
Space might be the perfect place to grow human organs - Popular Science
- AIIMS Bathinda Makes Breakthrough in Stem Cell Therapy Research for Heart Ailments - Elets - October 21st, 2024
- USC launches collaboration with StemCardia to advance heart regeneration therapies - University of Southern California - October 13th, 2024
- The heart is a resident tissue for hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells in zebrafish - Nature.com - September 3rd, 2024
- Opthea Announces Results of the A$55.9m (US$36.9m¹) Retail Entitlement Offer - July 16th, 2024
- Benitec Biopharma Reports Continued Durable Improvements in the Radiographic Assessments of Swallowing Efficiency and the Subject-Reported Outcome... - July 16th, 2024
- AstraZeneca Closes Acquisition of Amolyt Pharma - July 16th, 2024
- Addex Presents Positive Results from GABAB PAM Cough Program at the Thirteenth London International Cough Symposium (13th LICS) - July 16th, 2024
- Lexeo Therapeutics Announces Positive Interim Phase 1/2 Clinical Data of LX2006 for the Treatment of Friedreich Ataxia Cardiomyopathy - July 16th, 2024
- ANI Pharmaceuticals Announces the FDA Approval and Launch of L-Glutamine Oral Powder - July 16th, 2024
- MediWound Announces $25 Million Strategic Private Placement Financing - July 16th, 2024
- Atsena Therapeutics Appoints Joseph S. Zakrzewski as Board Chair - July 16th, 2024
- ASLAN Pharmaceuticals Announces Receipt of Nasdaq Delisting Determination; Has Determined Not to Appeal - July 16th, 2024
- Kraig Biocraft Laboratories Completes Phase One of its Spider Silk Production Facility Expansion - July 16th, 2024
- Pliant Therapeutics Announces Positive Long-Term Data from the INTEGRIS-PSC Phase 2a Trial Demonstrating Bexotegrast was Well Tolerated at 320 mg with... - July 16th, 2024
- Oncternal Announces Enrollment Completed and Dosing Initiated for Sixth Dose Cohort of Phase 1/2 Study of ONCT-534 for the Treatment of R/R Metastatic... - July 16th, 2024
- Rectify Pharmaceuticals Appoints Bharat Reddy as Chief Business Officer - July 16th, 2024
- Spectral AI Continues Support of Naked Short Selling Inquiry - July 16th, 2024
- Milestone Pharmaceuticals Refreshes Board of Directors - July 16th, 2024
- New Published Data Highlights Potential Cost-Savings of INPEFA® (sotagliflozin) for Heart Failure - July 16th, 2024
- Regenerative medicine can be a boon for those with Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis - Hindustan Times - April 21st, 2023
- Cardiac stem cells: Current knowledge and future prospects - April 13th, 2023
- Stem cell therapies in cardiac diseases: Current status and future ... - April 13th, 2023
- Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology | Johns Hopkins Heart and Vascular ... - April 13th, 2023
- Center for Regenerative Biotherapeutics - Cardiac Regeneration - April 13th, 2023
- MAGENTA THERAPEUTICS, INC. MANAGEMENT'S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL CONDITION AND RESULTS OF OPERATIONS (form 10-K) - Marketscreener.com - March 25th, 2023
- CAREDX, INC. MANAGEMENT'S DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL CONDITION AND RESULTS OF OPERATIONS (form 10-K) - Marketscreener.com - March 1st, 2023
- A Possible Connection between Mild Allergic Airway Responses and Cardiovascular Risk Featured in Toxicological Sciences - Newswise - February 4th, 2023
- Baby's life saved by surgeon who carried out world's first surgery ... - December 25th, 2022
- An organoid model of colorectal circulating tumor cells with stem cell ... - December 25th, 2022
- Skeletal Muscle Cell Induction from Pluripotent Stem Cells - December 1st, 2022
- Stem-cell niche - Wikipedia - December 1st, 2022
- Scientists Discover Protein Partners that Could Heal Heart Muscle | Newsroom - UNC Health and UNC School of Medicine - October 13th, 2022
- Global Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell ((iPSC) Market to Reach $0 Thousand by 2027 - Yahoo Finance - October 13th, 2022
- Scientists Spliced Human Brain Tissue Into The Brains of Baby Rats - ScienceAlert - October 13th, 2022
- Decoding the transcriptome of calcified atherosclerotic plaque at single-cell resolution | Communications Biology - Nature.com - October 13th, 2022
- Global Synthetic Stem Cells Market Is Expected To Reach Around USD 42 Million By 2025 - openPR - October 13th, 2022
- Merck and Moderna Announce Exercise of Option by Merck for Joint Development and Commercialization of Investigational Personalized Cancer Vaccine -... - October 13th, 2022
- Regenerative Medicine For Heart Diseases: How It Is Better Than Conventional Treatments | TheHealthSite.co - TheHealthSite - October 5th, 2022
- 'Love hormone' oxytocin could help reverse damage from heart attacks via cell regeneration - Study Finds - October 5th, 2022
- Recapitulating Inflammation: How to Use the Colon Intestine-Chip to Study Complex Mechanisms of IBD - Pharmaceutical Executive - September 27th, 2022
- Adult Stem Cells // Center for Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine ... - September 19th, 2022
- CCL7 as a novel inflammatory mediator in cardiovascular disease, diabetes mellitus, and kidney disease - Cardiovascular Diabetology - Cardiovascular... - September 19th, 2022
- Kite's CAR T-cell Therapy Yescarta First in Europe to Receive Positive CHMP Opinion for Use in Second-line Diffuse Large B-cell Lymphoma and... - September 19th, 2022
- Neural crest - Wikipedia - September 3rd, 2022
- Rise In Number Of CROS In Various Regions Such As Europe Is Expected To Fuel The Growth Of Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell Market At An Impressive CAGR... - September 3rd, 2022
- Discover the Mental and Physical Health Benefits of Fasting - Intelligent Living - September 3rd, 2022
- Heart Association fellowship to support research - Binghamton - August 26th, 2022
- Repeated intravenous administration of hiPSC-MSCs enhance the efficacy of cell-based therapy in tissue regeneration | Communications Biology -... - August 26th, 2022
- High intensity interval training protects the heart against acute myocardial infarction through SDF-1a, CXCR4 receptors and c-kit levels - Newswise - August 26th, 2022
- Yale University: Uncovering New Approaches to a Common Inherited Heart Disorder | India Education - India Education Diary - August 10th, 2022
- Heart failure in obesity: insights from proteomics in patients treated with or without weight-loss surgery | International Journal of Obesity -... - August 10th, 2022
- Pigs died after heart attacks. Scientists brought their cells back to life. - Popular Science - August 10th, 2022
- Protocol for a Nested, Retrospective Study of the Australian Placental Transfusion Study Cohort - Cureus - August 10th, 2022
- Autologous Cell Therapy Market Size to Grow by USD 4.11 billion, Bayer AG and Brainstorm Cell Therapeutics Inc. Among Key Vendors - Technavio - PR... - August 2nd, 2022
- UTSW researcher part of team awarded $36 million heart research grant - The Dallas Morning News - August 2nd, 2022
- Buffalo center fuels research that can save your life from heart disease and stroke - Buffalo News - August 2nd, 2022
- Hyperglycaemia-Induced Impairment of the Autorhythmicity and Gap Junction Activity of Mouse Embryonic Stem Cell-Derived Cardiomyocyte-Like Cells -... - July 25th, 2022
- NASA's Solution to Stem Cell Production is Out of this World - BioSpace - July 25th, 2022
- Inhibition of pancreatic EZH2 restores progenitor insulin in T1D donor | Signal Transduction and Targeted Therapy - Nature.com - July 25th, 2022
- 'My Teen Sweetheart And I Drifted Apart. 30 Years Later I Made a Shocking Discovery' - Newsweek - July 25th, 2022
- EU: New Blood? Proposed Revisions to the EUs Blood, Tissues and Cells Rules - GlobalComplianceNews - July 25th, 2022
- Stem Cells Market to Expand at a CAGR of 10.4% from 2021 to 2028 Travel Adventure Cinema - Travel Adventure Cinema - July 25th, 2022
- Cell Separation Technologies Market Expands with Rise in Prevalence of Chronic Diseases, States TMR Study - GlobeNewswire - July 25th, 2022
- Dental Membrane and Bone Graft Substitutes Market to Exceed Value of US$ 1,337 Mn by 2031 - PR Newswire UK - July 25th, 2022
- Stem Cells Used to Repair Heart Defects in Children - NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth - July 16th, 2022
- Pneumonia and Heart Disease: What You Should Know - Healthline - July 16th, 2022
- Promising solution to fatal genetic-disorder complications discovered by University professor and Ph.D. candidate - Nevada Today - July 16th, 2022
- Current and advanced therapies for chronic wound infection - The Pharmaceutical Journal - July 16th, 2022
- Why do some women struggle to breastfeed? A UCSC researcher on what we know, and don't - Lookout Santa Cruz - July 16th, 2022
- Mesenchymal stem cells: from roots to boost - PMC - July 8th, 2022
- New study allows researchers to more efficiently form human heart cells from stem cells - University of Wisconsin-Madison - July 8th, 2022
- Dr Victor Chang saved hundreds of lives. 31 years ago today, he was murdered. - Mamamia - July 8th, 2022
- Exosome Therapeutics Market Research Report Size, Share, New Trends and Opportunity, Competitive Analysis and Future Forecast Designer Women -... - July 8th, 2022
- Cell Line Development Market: Increase in Prevalence of Cancer and Other Chronic Diseases to Drive the Market - BioSpace - July 8th, 2022
- Homology Medicines Announces Peer-Reviewed Publication on Novel Discovery of AAVHSC with Robust Distribution to the Central Nervous System and... - July 8th, 2022
- What New Advances are there in 3D Bioprinting Tissues? - AZoM - June 30th, 2022
- Technical Advancements & Innovative Products Likely to Expand Application of Surgical Meshes in Untapped Domains, States Fact.MR - BioSpace - June 30th, 2022
- Liso-cel Approval Provides Earlier, Expanded Access to CAR T-cell Therapy in Second-line LBCL - OncLive - June 30th, 2022
- Stem cells, embryos, and the environment: a context for both science ... - June 20th, 2022
- Getting to the heart of engineering a heart - Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences - June 11th, 2022