LIVER TRANSPLANTATION: WHERE ARE WE?

Authors

  • Irinel POPESCU Past President, ASA Honorary Fellow

Keywords:

LIVER TRANSPLANTATION, MODERN SURGERY

Abstract

The beginning of 2024 saw a revival of xenotransplantation at the international level. If in the past “donors” were chosen from primate species (chimpanzee, baboon), considered to be the closest to humans from a genetic point of view (and therefore the least exposed to rejection), nowadays there is a different approach. Advances in genetic engineering have led to the possibility of modifying the genome of animals in those places responsible for the synthesis of the blood components involved in hyperacute rejection (those that make up “the complement system”). Through the method called CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) - Cas9 (a protein that allows binding to the targeted DNA sequence) certain genes can be “cut out” and removed or, if necessary, replaced with others, depending on what you need. This method was considered as potentially capable of creating transgenic animals whose organs could be transplanted into humans

Author Biography

  • Irinel POPESCU, Past President, ASA Honorary Fellow

    Professor of Surgery, “Dunarea de Jos” University Galați,
    Extension Enna (Italy)
    Head of Center of Digestive Diseases and Liver Transplantation,
    “Fundeni” Clinical Institute, Bucharest, Romania

References

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Additional Files

Published

2024-09-18

Issue

Vol. 128 No. 3 (2024): The Medical-Surgical Journal

Section

EDITORIAL

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