Thaindian News

By Ranjan Bhaduri
Washington, June 26, (THAINDIAN NEWS) Yale University researchers have successfully re-grown a rat lung under lab conditions and witnessed it breathe pretty fine. Following that the researchers have claimed that such an implantation procedure would be equally beneficial for all lung patients having difficulty in breathing.

What’s rewarding is that if the lungs of a human being is successfully implanted then they shall no more require the anti-rejection medicines.

Laura Niklason who happens to be a tissue engineer for Yale University told the media that the implantation procedure is the first step to re- generate lungs for both human beings and animals. Laura Niklason along with her fellow researchers removed the adult rat’s lung in the laboratory and then subjected it to “scaffolding”. As an advanced step they implanted fully functional lung cells right into the scaffolding. In order to regenerate the fetal conditions, the lung was soaked for a period of eight days inside a bio-reactor. Then as the final step, the researchers implanted the lung inside the animal where it actually breathed for hours.

As a matter of fact, lung transplantation is the only available treatment for damaged lung cells. However, its hard to cite a donor lung which is also associated with various infections and organ rejection by the human body. Only 20 percent of lung transplant patients survive after the surgery. In America itself the total number of deaths caused by lung related diseases is close to 400,000. In spite of the fact that the researchers have been successful in implanting the rat lung, Laura Niklason feels that the procedure demands more research before one can attempt the same with human beings.