Xenotransplantation Free Example

Moral Thinking in Highly Experimental Science

Modern transplantology has presented the possibility of extending life for a great amount of people with serious illnesses nowadays, but it also gave rise to a number of new difficult moral, legal and social problems. Perhaps, in allotransplantation (transplanting organs and tissues from person to person), the most acute problem is the lack of donor material. In many respects, this is the main reason why doctors go for the transplantation of such internal organs as kidney, heart, liver, only when traditional medical or surgical treatment has completely exhausted itself and the patient is doomed to die soon. The lack of donor organs becomes the reverse side of the success of transplants, as soon as there is a real opportunity to prolong the lives of patients in the final stages of chronic diseases. It cannot be said that all possibilities for the reduction of this problem have been exhausted, but one of the seriously considered possibilities is xenotransplantation, i.e. animal organs transplant. Thus, although the question of the morality of this method has not yet been resolved, xenotransplantation is one of the most promising ways to address the lack of donor organs in transplantology, since medical advances allow to provide operations to replace individual worn or injured human organs with internal organs of animals.

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Researching the background of the issue, xenotransplantation is now one of the ways to solve the problem of lack of donor organs. Xenotransplantation as a concept means the transplantation of organs from one biological species to another. This is transplant, in which the donor and the recipient belong to different genera, families, and even species. For some people, this procedure looks absurd, immoral, and even causes conflicts with religious beliefs. Nevertheless, xenotransplantation is quite a viable and promising direction of modern science, which can save many lives in the future. The idea of ​​using animals as donors is based on the opinion that the animal is a less valuable living organism than a human is. Both animal advocates and representatives of transhumanism, who believe that every living creature has the right to life, oppose this idea. They consider it is inhumane to kill one leaving creature for the sake of continuing the life of another. At the same time, man has been killing animals for many millennia to satisfy own needs for food, clothing, etc. However, a significant ethical and psychological problem is that the individual accepts an animal organ as his own, recognizes organism as whole, truly human, even after transplantation of some organ of the animal. Xenotransplantation is considered one of the most promising ways to solve the problem of lack of donor organs.

Xenotransplantation is not a new direction in science. The first experiments on interspecific blood transfusion date back to the 17th century (Dooldeniya and Warrens, 2003). A breakthrough in the field of xenotransplantation have made the works of scientists in the frames of Cardiothoracic Surgery Research Program at National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, US (Chan and Mohiuddin, 2017). These scientists successfully transplanted genetically modified pig hearts to baboons; moreover, new organs functioned for more than a year.

Formally, xenotransplantation has a long history because such attempts are recorded in the history of medicine, as well as attempts to transfuse blood from animals. As the development of scientific medicine in experimental studies, it was found that in some combinations of species, grafts are destroyed very quickly due to the mechanisms of nonspecific resistance. This occurs without the need to include the mechanisms of immunity associated with the recognition of histocompatibility products, and such species are called discordant. Accordingly, combinations of species where the non-specific protection mechanisms are not immediately activated are called concordant. However, seriously the possibilities of xenoplants began to be considered only after the creation of a population of transgenic animals (pigs), whose cells express human proteins that prevent discordant conflict.

Researchers are trying to solve the problem of the shortage of donor organs by developing mechanical components that will help the damaged organs to work, these devices are associated with a high risk of infection, blood clots and bleeding in patients. More promising is the direction of research in the field of stem cells, as well as the cultivation of organs in the laboratory for transplantation. However, the ability to grow a fully functional organ for humans is still not as affordable as the world needs. Thus, xenotransplantation can compensate the deficiency of human organs.

To prove the argument of this assignment, the world scientific community is wary of the possibilities of xenoplants not only because of the unresolved problems of the physiological compatibility of human and animal organs, but mainly due to the risk of animal disease transmission to humans (the speech is going about xenosis) and the possibility of launching pandemics with unpredictable consequences. For instance, “The immunologic barriers to successful xenotransplantation are primarily related to the presence of natural anti-pig antibodies in humans and NHPs that bind to antigens expressed on the transplanted pig organ (the most important of which is galactose-α1,3-galactose [Gal]),5 and activate the complement cascade, which results in rapid destruction of the graft, a process known as hyperacute rejection” (Cooper et al, 2018). It is also important to note that biotech firms have already invested many millions of dollars in xenotransplantation researches, and this fact encourages the overly optimistic tone of some publications in this area.

Currently, there are prospects for solving the problem of transplanting organs from animals to humans. The technique of pulmonary hypertension by lung transplantation is being actively developed. To make pig’s lungs biologically compatible with the human body, it is important to perform about twelve genetic modifications of the porcine genome. Organ rejection will occur without these modifications of the porcine genome. Moreover, there are ambitious plans to develop technologies for xenotransplantation of the kidneys, liver, heart and cornea of pigs.

The main xenotransplantation problems of biological and technical nature include the development of acute immunological conflict; possibility of infection with animal viruses; the need for massive supply of animals for the removal of organs and tissues. Higher primates, although they are close biological relatives of man, are not suitable for these purposes for a number of reasons. In such a way, despite the similarities between humans and other primates, pigs are considered the most valuable donors for xenotransplantation today (Sharp, 2014). Our evolutionary branches separated from each other about 80 million years ago, but complete sequencing of the pig genome has shown that people and pigs have very similar DNA.

To explain, pigs are considered the most promising donors because their genotype and anatomical structure is close to a person. The biggest advantage of donor pigs is the availability of organs. This is a potentially unlimited resource of valuable bodies that are simply being thrown away today. If xenotransplantation becomes a reality, donor pigs will address the problem of organ deficiencies in the coming years until stem cell technology will be ready. Moreover, hopes are placed on the so-called transgenic pigs, because the humane gene was transplanted in such pigs. As a result, their tissues are more compatible with human ones, and they are less susceptible to immune rejection (Williams, 2017). There exist many opinions that such studies have a great future. There is also evidence of the results of successful introduction of porcine cells into humans in certain diseases, for example, in diabetes mellitus.

Supporters of xenotransplantation are confident that this can significantly improve the outcome of organ transplants. Pigs can be picked, kept in ideal conditions, regularly checked for infections, and organs can be removed from the animal under anesthesia just before transplantation. This eliminates many of the risks associated with organ transplants from deceased donors, including possible transmission of infection.

Obviously, not all people view xenotransplantation as a kind of positive decision. Each research step is coordinated with ethics committees. Even for major medical scientists, the issue of xenotransplantation seems to be an unprecedented dilemma. Ethical discussions are expected before the relevant technologies are approved. For people far from medical science, the possibility of transplanting organs from animals to humans turned out to be so wild idea that many respondents removed it from the list of solutions to the problem.

To continue, even assuming that all problems of a biological and technical nature can be solved, a number of ethical difficulties remain. First of all, the question arises about the acceptability and limits of redesigning the human body, since there is a danger of a violation of human identity and integrity of the body after transplantation of animal biomaterial. In particular, the same widely debated argument operates here: the practice of xenotransplantation can become more and more popular over time, so that the human body of the same individual can be replaced with an increasing number of animal organs and tissues. The results of such a far-reaching alteration of the human body are completely uncertain from the moral and cultural point of view.

In addition, advocates of animal rights also express arguments against xenotransplantation, because the development of xenotransplantation should provide a truly inexhaustible source of biological raw materials. Thus, a new area of ​​animal exploitation and a new branch of their mass consumption are emerging (Zimmer, 2018). It is still very difficult to predict the ways, in which the success of xenotransplantation will affect the state of society, its self-perception, attitude to the environment, etc. Nevertheless, the international community, including a big amount of influential medical organizations, calls for caution and strict control over ongoing xenotransplantation research.

In such a way, the opportunity to use pigs as organ donors for humans has activated immunological, virological, molecular and biological, including genetically engineered, studies of these animals. The mechanism of rejection of the transplanted pig organ was identified, and ways to overcome it were identified. The next step was the creation of special – transgenic animals, the cells of which contain, in addition to their own, genes that are also not characteristic of this type. In the body of such animals, proteins are produced that prevent damage to a transplanted organ by the human immune system.

In fact, this is done by a genetically engineered (transgenic) method that causes changes in the genetic apparatus of the pig embryo. Then the embryo is introduced into the uterus of the surrogate mother, where the pregnancy proceeds. In the case of a born piglet, in many respects, the tissues are compatible with human ones and are not subjected to acute rejection.

To conclude, we have explored the main issues associated with xenotransplantation, and have proved the thesis that transgenic technologies have a great future in xenotransplantation. It becomes possible to engraft and preserve the xenograft without constant treatment throughout the rest of life. Thus, due to the disclosure of the mechanisms of tissue incompatibility and the achievements of genetic engineering, a real prospect of xenotransplantation has appeared. Perhaps the genetically engineered pig is the way to the ultimate solution to the problem. Although the main difficulties are still to come, there is every reason to assert that the problem of the hyper-acute rejection of the xenoorgan can be solved soon enough, and that people can use a pig or other mammal as an unlimited source of organs for humans.

Works Cited

Chan, J. and M. Mohiuddin. “Heart Xenotransplantation.” Curr Opin Organ Transplant, vol. 22, no. 6, 2017, pp. 549-554. US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health, doi: 10.1097/MOT.0b013e32830fdf89.

Cooper, D., et al. “Xenotransplantation—the current status and prospects.” British Medical Bulletin, vol. 125, no. 1, 2018, pp. 5-14.

Dooldeniya, M. and A. Warrens. “Xenotransplantation: where are we today?” Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, vol. 93, no. 3, 2003, pp. 111-117.

Sharp, L. The Transplant Imaginary: Mechanical Hearts, Animal Parts, and Moral Thinking in Highly Experimental Science. University of California Press, 2014. Print.

Williams, S. “Jumping Genes Inactivated with CRISPR in Pigs.” The Scientist.com, 2017, www.the-scientist.com/the-nutshell/jumping-genes-inactivated-with-crispr-in-pigs-31100. Accessed 8 December 2018.

Zimmer, C. “Editing of Pig DNA May Lead to More Organs for People.” The New York Times, 2018, www.nytimes.com/2015/10/20/science/editing-of-pig-dna-may-lead-to-more-organs-for-people.html. Accessed 8 December 2018.