돼지의 폐가 인간에게 이식되는 날이 가까워졌다는 영국 [데일리메일]의 뉴스입니다.
호주 멜버른 소재 성빈센트병원의 과학자들은 돼지의 장기와 인간의 혈액을 부적합하게 만드는 ‘GAL 유전자(Gal gene)’로 불리는 돼지 DNA를 제거함으로써 돼지-인간 이종간 장기이식이 앞당겨지게 되었다고 합니다.
멜버른 소재 알프레드병원의글렌 웨스톨(Glenn Westall) 박사는 세계 최초로 인간-돼지 폐 이식이 현실로 다가왔다고 전망습니다.
그는 ”대여섯 시간의 실험을 하는 동안 돼지의 폐들은 처음 실험을 시작할 때와 마찬가지로 잘 작동했던 것 같다.”며, “혈액은 산소 없이 폐로 들어가 산소와 함께 나왔다. 이것이야말로 정확한 폐의 기능”이라고 설명했습니다.
그는 “이것은 (돼지의) 폐가 우리가 기대했던대로 완벽하게 잘 작동하고 있음을 보여준다”고 밝혔으며, “이것은 지난 20년간 실시되었던 실험들과 비교해볼때 아주 중요한 발전을 이룬 것이다.”고 얘기했습니다.
호주 연구팀의 최종 연구결과는 오는 8월 벤쿠버에서 열릴 세계이식학회에서 발표될 예정이라고 합니다.
동물의 장기를 인간에게 이식하는 이종장기이식(xenotransplantation)은 의료윤리학계에서 논란이 되고 있습니다.
의료윤리학자협회의 니콜라스 톤티-필리피니(Nicholas Tonti-Filippini) 교수는 “이종장기 이식은 동물의 질병을 인간에게 전파할 가능성이 있다.”고 밝혔습니다.
그는 “유전자조작 돼지의 창조는 윤리적으로 받아들일 수 없다.”며 “이것은 그것을 당신이 뭐라고 부르길 원하던 간에 기본적으로 인간-돼지이며, 잡종일 뿐이다.”고 비판했습니다.
아울러 “이것은 인류사회(인간공동체)가 일부분은 인간이고 또 다른 일부분은 동물인 것(잡종)을 받아들일 준비가 되어 있는지의 문제이다”라고 덧붙였습니다.
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Pig lungs could soon be transplanted into humans after astonishing medical breakthrough
By Daily Mail Reporter
출처 : [데일리메일(Daily Mail)] Last updated at 3:17 AM on 04th February 2010
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1248384/Pig-lungs-soon-transplanted-humans-astonishing-medical-breakthrough.html?ITO=1490
Pigs lungs could soon be used for human transplants
Pig lungs could be transplanted into humans to overcome a shortage of donor organs after a medical breakthrough.
Australian scientists have paved the way for animal-human transplants in as little as five years, after keeping pig lungs alive and functioning with human blood.
The breakthrough came after scientists at Melbourne’s St Vincent’s Hospital were able to remove a section of pig DNA called the Gal gene, which made the pig organs incompatible with human blood.
Prof Tony D’Apice – who has been breeding pigs for possible transplants since 1989 – said human DNA was added to the engineered animals to control blood clotting and rejection in humans.
Dr Glenn Westall, from the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne, said the world-first discovery meant pig-human lung transplants were a real prospect.
He said: ‘Five to six hours into the experiment they seemed to be working as well as they were at the start.
‘The blood went into the lungs without oxygen and came out with oxygen, which is the exact function of the lungs.
‘It showed that these lungs were working perfectly well and doing as we were expecting them to do.’
‘This is a significant advance compared to experiments that have been performed over the past 20 years.’
The Alfred scientists removed the lungs and hooked them up to a machine mimicking the human circulation system under a process mirroring that used for traditional lung transplants.
The machine uses a ventilator to cause the lungs to ‘breathe’ while a pump acting as a heart allows blood to flow through the lungs.
Previous attempts to combine unmodified pig lungs and human blood ended abruptly two years ago when blood clots began forming almost immediately, causing the organs to become so blocked no blood could pass through.
But when the genetically modified lungs were used at the end of last year the results were overwhelming, fuelling hopes of clinical trials in five to 10 years.
Dr Westall said: ‘Where before we saw the system crash and the lungs destroyed within 10 minutes, the lungs seemed to be working perfectly well at the end of our experiment after many hours.
‘This is a major advance but there remain significant hurdles.’
The full results of the research are being kept a secret before being announced at a world transplant meeting in Vancouver in August.
The possibility of animal-to-human transplants – xenotransplantation – has divided the medical ethics community.
Medical ethicist Associate Professor Nicholas Tonti-Filippini said such transplants had the potential to bring animal diseases into the human population.
He said the creation of genetically modified pigs was not ethically acceptable, explaining: ‘It is basically a human-pig, a hybrid, or whatever you want to call it.
‘It is about whether the community is prepared to accept a part human, part animal.’
