New strategy helps build synthetic organs from scratch. This enabled the researchers to grow functioning liver tissue in the lab that could be transplanted into mice with liver disease.
Brain organoids are tiny models that neuroscientists use to learn more about how the brain grows and works. But new research finds important differences between the model and the real thing.
Xenobots have been called the world’s first “living robots”. They are made entirely of living tissue, and can be programmed to move towards a certain object.
Stem cells show much promise, both for testing drugs and for treating disease. But the hype around them has been dangerous, as most treatments are in very experimental stages and can cause harm.
Tobias Deuse, University of California, San Francisco
The idea behind regenerative medicine is that the patient is both the donor and recipient of healthy tissue grown from stem cells. But sometimes the transplanted cells are rejected. Now we know why.
Tissue engineering and regenerative medicine is based on three key requirements working together: signals from body tissues and organs, responding stem cells, and scaffolds.
Dangerous open wounds known as cutaneous ulcers are common in people with diabetes and bedsores. Now scientists have figured out how to reprogram the cells inside these wounds to heal themselves.
Figuring out what causes diseases like autism, schizophrenia and depression is tricky. Now Stanford University researchers are turning blood into brain cells to study these diseases in a dish.
‘Mini brains’ can be grown in the lab, and brains of decapitated pigs were recently ‘kept alive’ for a day and a half. But what makes a conscious brain?
The nomination deadline for science’s most lucrative prize – the Breakthrough Prize – is looming. Why has no Canadian ever received this prize, despite groundbreaking discoveries?
Neuroscience labs around the world may need to reevaluate some of their assumptions about whether what works in animals will really produce meaningful treatments for people.
Professor - Emerging Technologies (Stem Cells) at The University of Melbourne and Group Leader - Stem Cell Ethics & Policy at the Murdoch Children's Research Institute, The University of Melbourne
Executive Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Electromaterials Science and Director of the Intelligent Polymer Research Institute, University of Wollongong