Why Your New Heart Could Be Made in Space One Day (bbc.com) 75
Imagine a laboratory growing human hearts - and imagine that laboratory floating in space hundreds of miles above the surface of the Earth. That may sound like science fiction, but bizarre as it seems, it could bring new hope for transplant patients within the next decade. From a report: While about 7,600 heart transplants were carried out around the world in 2017, there's a desperate shortage of organs, with thousands of people on waiting lists dying every year. Efforts to grow human hearts in the lab are showing promise, but are hampered by the need for the organs to grow around a "scaffolding" to make sure they don't collapse during the process. Reliably removing the scaffolding once the heart is complete is proving to be a challenge.
Space tech company Techshot believes zero gravity could be the answer. The International Space Station (ISS) is in constant freefall around the planet, meaning that anything inside experiences effective weightlessness, known technically as microgravity. This means organs could be grown without the need for any scaffolding, believes Rich Boling, the firm's vice-president of corporate advancement. One day hearts could be grown commercially for transplant, Techshot believes. [...] Developed in partnership with Nasa, Techshot's BioFabrication Facility (BFF) is a microwave oven-sized device that uses 3D printing techniques to create patches for heart repairs using a patient's own stem cells.
Space tech company Techshot believes zero gravity could be the answer. The International Space Station (ISS) is in constant freefall around the planet, meaning that anything inside experiences effective weightlessness, known technically as microgravity. This means organs could be grown without the need for any scaffolding, believes Rich Boling, the firm's vice-president of corporate advancement. One day hearts could be grown commercially for transplant, Techshot believes. [...] Developed in partnership with Nasa, Techshot's BioFabrication Facility (BFF) is a microwave oven-sized device that uses 3D printing techniques to create patches for heart repairs using a patient's own stem cells.
Re: Not in this Trumpverse (Score:2, Informative)
Living organisms grown in space have shown a wide range of unwanted behaviour, lack of gravity provides zero clues to the organ or organism as to what direction is up or down and you would just end up with 7 heartpits all disconnected in a spiral arrangement that arises from circling the planet
Re: Not in this Trumpverse (Score:4, Insightful)
<Sarcasm>Yea, there is a chance that such an experiment may not work. So why bother trying at all. Sure the benefit can mean a way to save lives. But there are variables which are untested and we don't know 100% what the results are. So lets not try. </Sarcasm>
For a site, that is suppose to cover science and technology news, there is a heck of a lot of posts of people just coming up with reasons out of the blue, on why it will fail miserably. While Scientific reporting is general really bad, but there are a lot of things that are worth a shot to try. Especially, if a success could be beneficial.
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No part of the human body was designed,
On earth, human hearts are inside the body, supported by the flesh around them. The net effect of gravity on a heart inside the body is substantially lower than a standalone heart.
Some of the reasons that microgravity is hard on humans are known. They are irrelevant to the growth of a heart in a microgravity environment.
It's not your money, so STFU.
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For a site, that is suppose to cover science and technology news, there is a heck of a lot of posts of people just coming up with reasons out of the blue, on why it will fail miserably. While Scientific reporting is general really bad, but there are a lot of things that are worth a shot to try. Especially, if a success could be beneficial.
I dunno if a lot of people have aged into curmudgeon-land, but I agree. These experiments are worthwhile doing. Will it fail? Quite possibly.
But it might work, and it might end up solving the rejection issue. Some of our olde fartes declaring it a failure might just be interested in that.
The only downside I can think of is peripheral. If we make it possible for people to have a brand new strong young heart, there are many other killers waiting in the wings. We've come a good ways in treating cancer,
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Hearts for the Wealthy (Score:2)
How much will it cost to launch the needed starter cell culture into space, presumably have someone up their manning it (even if mostly automated), return it from space...etc.
Even Walter White probably didn't get enough meth money to buy a new heart. In the US this would mean new hearts would only be for the wealthy. Can the process be done in bulk? Or can we get the cost of launch down enough?
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Sure back in the olden days. Water Closets were a luxury for the rich. Running water, a place to take your output somewhere where you don't need to think about it. This was something only the Rich had. It took generations of infrastructure and improvement in processes for the average person to have running water in their houses, and their own WC.
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Not really a good analogy, because once the plumbing and sewer system is built the maintenance cost is very very low compared to the initial outlay. Hooking up additional houses is also tiny compared to the initial network cost.
But getting stuff into space (and back) is always going to be fairly expensive, unless/until we get a space elevator.
Re:Hearts for the Wealthy (Score:4, Informative)
How much will it cost to launch the needed starter cell culture into space, presumably have someone up their manning it (even if mostly automated), return it from space...etc.
SpaceX plans to eventually get costs down to $1700 per kg with the Falcon Heavy. I could almost see the first privately (or semi-privately)owned space station being one where companies can rent research/production space and the station operator has techs up there to run the experiments/production facilities, maintain the station, etc. While it could be expensive, it probably wouldn't be prohibitively so. Especially considering you would be making (hopefully) rejection-proof, lifesaving replacement organs.
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So an adult weighing 80kg will cost $136,000. That's just for the person, doesn't include the air, water, food and everything else to sustain them.
There might be multidisciplinary humans in orbit who can take on tasks for your company, but it looks like the cost of these humans would probably be on the order of something like $10,000 per hour, once you take into account all the costs of running the habitat for them.
So your hearts are going to need a couple of hours handling individually at most if you want
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There's an easy solution to that. Star Trek transporters. By the time space flight becomes cheap enough, we'll probably have those.
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I would put more bet on a Space Elevator then on a transporter. The technology and theory is still basically impossible (We teleported a Proton, not even a full atom). There will be decades or century of debate on the ethics of a Transporter. When being transported do we get killed and then a copy made of us.
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My comment was a joke. Maybe I should've added a sarcasm tag. My point was basically that none of these options will be available in my lifetime, making all of them "science fiction", and thus betting on any one over the other is moot.
If you want to talk potential ethics, I don't see how it would be any more unethical to transport cell cultures up and a finished heart back down than it would be to remove cells from a body, grow a new heart outside the body, and then surgically swap it for the old one. A bun
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How much will it cost to launch the needed starter cell culture into space, presumably have someone up their manning it (even if mostly automated), return it from space...etc.
Forget that. Think about how much the research costs would be. This isn't something you can test on the ground - you have to actually do your research in zero-G. And something like this will take a loooooong time to figure out so it's going to be ludicrously expensive to do the R&D. Production would probably be a modest sum by comparison presuming they can automate it to a useful degree.
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This is only one of several reasons this will never happen. The radiation dose alone will probably damage the heart before it can be used.
Re: Hearts for the Wealthy (Score:1)
Do you think radiation is some sort of evils death magic or something? You know that there are living astronauts on the ISS right now right? And that theyâ(TM)ve done all sorts of successful experiments where the grow and culture various things?
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As with most technology. At first only the ultra rich can afford it, then the normal rich, over time price will come down until it is practical for most people.
Right now a launch into space will cost about 60 million dollars. lets say retrieval would be double that 120 million. So lets say the full process will be 200million dollars.
With the ability to do 200 hearts at once, that would be a million dollars per heart. That would possible for the normal rich people. If the process can be expanded to 1000 he
If only... (Score:1)
Scientists had invented some type of material that dissolves in tissue over time...
Quite a challenge (Score:3)
So an organ that evolved to grow and work in a 1G environment will be grown in a 0G environment? Methinks there might be some consequences to that. If they can pull it off that would be amazing but that sounds like quite a challenge. It's not immediately clear to me how 0G removes the need for scaffolding entirely. Would it not just change the type of scaffolding needed rather than removing the need entirely? Could be an improvement of course - I'm not bashing the idea - just trying to think it through. Fluids and other chemicals behave differently in the absence of gravity and I'd be shocked if that wasn't a big technical hurdle.
Assuming the technology is workable though the real problem will be funding the research. Researching this will require spending some pretty serious time in orbit and despite the best efforts of SpaceX and others that remains pretty darn expensive and will remain so for some time to come.
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Most of our organs were grown in a neutral buoyant environment, which has a lot of the same effects of being in 0g.
Neutral buoynacy versus microgravity (Score:3)
Most of our organs were grown in a neutral buoyant environment, which has a lot of the same effects of being in 0g.
Some but not all. There are two very important differences. Objects in neutral buoyancy still experience the effects of gravity on their mass. This affects fluids and tissues significantly. The second is that friction and drag is still in play in neutral buoyancy due to the fluid medium. We already know that microgravity has a measurable effect on muscle growth and structure and the heart is a muscle.
The idea of growing organs in microgravity is an interesting one but there are a lot of potential reaso
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Consider the source (Score:3)
All I need is a heart. (Score:1)
Not for me. I will continue to take my clunky metal body off to see the wizard.
You can pry my old heart from my cold dead hands (Score:5, Funny)
Oh wait.
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Wait, what?
Someone to yell Kalima, rip my still beating heart out, and toss it into molten lava, what else?
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the foetus is the scaffolding, the woman is life support.
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"Human hearts are routinely grown in our 1G environment. The standard procedure uses a woman, "
And it needs 9 months. This will be done by 9 female scientists in 1 month.
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Great! (Score:3)
One more incredible medical service that will be available to those who can afford it. Gotta take care of rich folks! Who would give the rest of us jobs?
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Sort of like airplane travel, you mean? Or television, perhaps? Both of which were only available to the very wealthy at first....
So what is the scaffolding made out of?? (Score:2)
silly science fiction (Score:2)
Lab-grown hearts (assuming they are practical) should be done right here on terra firma. No space cowboys needed.
The best solution is get off your lazy ass, exercise, and cut way back on the Twinkies.
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You're a sad, pathetic little boy. Go find your mommy and tell her you don't deserve cookies and milk before she tucks you into bed tonight.
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You're absolutely correct. [slashdot.org]
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Take care of the heart you were born with.. (Score:2)
Valentine's day (Score:2)
Can you even begin to fathom the cost? (Score:2)
This is some Bezos level pricing - radiation deflection up the wazoo so the things grow ok in space, power supply, heating, servicing and what have you. Flying it up there, flying it back - astronomical... pricing. That's some seriously expensive heart.
Considering the morality of some of the rich, wouldn't it be easier to just harvest them from some very fit, stem celled up 'donors'? I'm sure within 15 years China will have some PREEMO organs up for grabs, we're talking Syndicate (yes, that Syndicate)
Orrrrr (Score:2)
Probably a bit cheaper and simpler to just grow them in a fluid with neutral buoyancy. Maybe thatâ(TM)s not possible, but Iâ(TM)m not going to take the word of the guy selling me space launches.
Why not have a degradable scaffolding? (Score:2)