Xenotransplants in lawsuits?

2000/08/19 Irazabalbeitia, Inaki - kimikaria eta zientzia-dibulgatzaileaElhuyar Fundazioa

• Genetika

There is great interest and debate about xenotransplants, organ transplants among species. This would solve the shortage of organs for human organ transplantation, but it also poses an important risk: human contamination of animal diseases. We cannot forget the case of AIDS, since HIV is one of the real troviruses of monkeys. To this we must also add the absolute rejection that occurs when taking the foreign organ. This is highlighted by the Catalan expert Rafael Mañez. In the issue of the magazine Zientzia eta Teknika from July to August.

Transmission of diseases

The newspapers have given it: Researchers at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, Dolly's parents, abandon research on xenotransplants for fear of transmitting diseases among species. Likewise, the journal Nature will publish shortly two papers that aim to give light to the question of the viability of xenotransplants.

Researchers at the Roslin Institute work on creating a transgenic pig that could be an organ bank for human transplants. According to the statements of Ian Wilme, one of the researchers, this line of work can stagger. Two reasons have been mentioned: on the one hand, that the Californian company Geron Bio-Med, which supports research, wants to devote these funds to other tasks and, on the other, that the company itself may be concerned that xenotransplants do not contaminate viral epidemics to humans. So things, it is not yet clear whether the investigation is going to be interrupted, or why.

Clonic pigs

However, Nature's studies shed new light on two aspects of xenotransplants. Keith Campbell and his colleagues, researchers from the Scottish company PPL Therapeutics, have for the first time obtained clonic pigs from somatic cells of adult pigs, as did the Roslingos with Dolly. Science has also published this week that Japanese researchers from the National Institute of Animal Industry have done the same thing from fetal cells. These advances allow obtaining genetically modified pigs with great precision. What does this mean? The main responsible for the production of rejection in humans when ingesting the organs of pigs is a certain galactose sugar of the cell membrane of pigs organs. If with genetic techniques it is possible that the gene that governs the appearance of this galactose, the gene 1.3 galactosil transferase to the pressure, is not expressed, the pig would not have that galactose in the membrane of its cells and the possibility that man reject its organs would be much less. It seems that the viability of xenotransplants is closer.

Daniel Solomon, of the Scripps Research Institute of California, and the work of his fellow Daracusa on the other side of the coin. They explain that endogenous retroviruses in pigs can infect human cells in crops.

Moreover, transplanting pancreatic pig cells to mice with immune casia has resulted in an infection spread by PERV. Are pigs therefore a safe source of organs for humans?