Need a Lung?

[3113]

Cool!

US scientists reported important progress Thursday towards building new human lungs by successfully implanting lab-cultivated cells into a rat's lungs, and by creating an artificial device on a microchip that mimics the human lung.

Yale University researchers managed to create lungs that worked from 45 to 120 minutes by using laboratory-cultivated cells and implanted them into rats, a scientific first. Separately, researchers with the Wyss Institute at Harvard University, Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston created a device that acts like a human lung using blood vessel cells. It is about the size of a rubber eraser.

Full story here.

 

[mynameisben]

US scientists reported important progress Thursday towards building new human lungs by successfully implanting lab-cultivated cells into a rat's lungs, and by creating an artificial device on a microchip that mimics the human lung.

Yale University researchers managed to create lungs that worked from 45 to 120 minutes by using laboratory-cultivated cells and implanted them into rats, a scientific first. Separately, researchers with the Wyss Institute at Harvard University, Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston created a device that acts like a human lung using blood vessel cells. It is about the size of a rubber eraser.

This story frightens me. I envision (those who insist on envisage can chomp at their naughty bits) armies of micro miniaturized lungs invading California to smoke up the nation's precious medical marijuana supply. It's evil research, sponsored by Big Tobacco as a desperate ploy to nip their biggest rival in the bud. But the plan is doomed to disaster. Trillions of doped up micro-lungs will wander the streets of L.A., eventually finding their way into medical centers for cancer treatment, on which the Government will be all too happy to squander taxpayer money to support their misguided War on Drugs. Rat populations will soar as new armies of micro-lungs will need replacing. The computer industry will stall, as Intel diverts its fabrication resources to producing rat lung controller chips. Spiraling healthcare costs will break the economy. Plague, pestilence and cannabis extinction will rule the day.

No good shall ever come of this.

 

[Handley_Page]

This story frightens me. I envision (those who insist on envisage can chomp at their naughty bits) armies of micro miniaturized lungs invading California to smoke up the nation's precious medical marijuana supply. It's evil research, sponsored by Big Tobacco as a desperate ploy to nip their biggest rival in the bud. But the plan is doomed to disaster. Trillions of doped up micro-lungs will wander the streets of L.A., eventually finding their way into medical centers for cancer treatment, on which the Government will be all too happy to squander taxpayer money to support their misguided War on Drugs. Rat populations will soar as new armies of micro-lungs will need replacing. The computer industry will stall, as Intel diverts its fabrication resources to producing rat lung controller chips. Spiraling healthcare costs will break the economy. Plague, pestilence and cannabis extinction will rule the day.

No good shall ever come of this.

ON the other hand, those who have or are suffering from diseases of the lung (emphysema, asbestosis, etc..), may well be Very Interested to learn of this technology.