Testing a Bioartificial Liver
Artificial organs capable of performing some of the functions of the real thing don't have to look or be structured in the same way as our evolved organs. They just have to work. Efforts to develop artificial organs have benefited from progress in the ability to control and manage cell populations, giving rise to a first generation of hybrid devices that use both cells and machinery. A number of bulky prototypes to augment various kidney, pancreatic, lung, and liver functions with engineered tissue have been developed in recent years. In these cases the necessary cells can be grown and maintained outside the body and a patient's blood circulated through them on a regular basis. Miniaturization isn't necessary in order to obtain these benefits, which makes the research and development process much easier. In the future one might imagine that smaller and more efficient versions could be implanted, putting this technology in competition with regenerative medicine and tissue engineering of replacement organs.
Physicians and scientists are testing a novel, human cell based, bioartificial liver support system for patients with acute liver failure, often a fatal diagnosis. "Liver failure patients and their doctors have long been frustrated by the critical need to provide the kind of life-saving care kidney patients are afforded by dialysis. The quest for a device that can fill in for the function of the liver, at least temporarily, has been underway for decades. A bioartificial liver, also known as a BAL, could potentially sustain patients with acute liver failure until their own livers self-repair."In the bioartificial liver under investigation, blood is drawn from the patient via a central venous line, and then is filtered through a component system featuring four tubes, each about 1 foot long, which are embedded with liver cells. The external organ support system is designed to perform critical functions of a normal liver, including protein synthesis and the processing and cleaning of a patient's blood. The filtered and treated blood is then returned to the patient through the central line. "If successful, a bioartificial liver could not only allow time for a patient's own damaged organ to regenerate, but also promote that regeneration. In the case of chronic liver failure, it also potentially could support some patients through the long wait for a liver transplant."