“Steve Austin, astronaut, his life is in danger; we have the technology to transform him in a powerful cybernetic organism”. Six million dollar man, 1973.
This was probably the first time that humankind started thinking in saving human’s life but with a small difference, this time it would not be only with medicine, it would be using technology and a little bit of imagination to save Steve Austin’s life and turn him into the “Six million dollar man” or, as we know him in our country “El hombre nuclear”. It is not easy to say that this was inspiring for someone to start thinking about the possibility to create artificial organs, but history has shown that there is a tight relation between sci-fi and real science. Documentation about this topic refers, that it was in 1990 when people started thinking in regeneration or the creation of artificial organs.
Advances in the development of in vitro cell tissues and organs, have shown promising developments as alternative to transplant, discover new treatments and restoration of specific organs or body functions. Organs creation or regeneration is a process where a tissue or an organ is created from “stem cells”, now at least 3.000 clinical trials are being developed around the world, with a promising future in the coming years.
Since studies started it has been possible to create a heart, lung, liver, kidney, ovary, intestine and cornea, only at the experimental field, however there are two cases that they were taken to the real life, both were trachea transplantations for subjects with tracheal stenosis; in these situations the life of these persons improved, which is a good advantage and gives more hope to keep supporting research on this scenario. Among the advantages of this scientific advance there are: the power to replace damaged tissues or whole organs conducting effective and timely transplantation because of the shortage of organs donors and the generation and rejection in the person receiving an organ. They can also be used to test new therapies or drugs with greater reliability than when tried only with animals, and this would be a way to protect species.
Throughout the history of mankind there has been a great interest in understanding life and nature, and all the human efforts have been directed to this, but, under what interest man wants to have control over this?. With these scientific advances, there is a possibility to extend life on an unthinkable way, but the magnitude which this may have in the universe is unknown, this is an ethical dilemma in the scientific field. Other topics to consider are: lack of long term studies to understand the side effects, maternal effects, effects on future generations born of parents with artificial organs, the possibility of new diseases or conditions in humans and the impact on the environment.
Although organs creation or regeneration are focused on the improvement of life quality, there could also be a lot of interests when the life of one person or hundreds are in a person´s hands, a country or certain group of people, and this is one of the points that must be checked under the etic sight and not only wait until something displeasing happens, to start thinking in the way to control the uses of these organs, -the uses of artificial life creation. In my opinion, I support all that could help the improvement of life, in all of its dimensions and I think that with good vigilance and control this will help many people to find a new meaning for their lives, I know that this topic makes humankind rethink several things that have been raised through all human history, so, it is not only necessary vigilance and control, but also education to help people in general to understand that despite human kind can create life “without counting” the help of mother nature it doesn’t mean that humans are superior and therefore there is no need to take care about nature and environment. We would also have to consider carefully the side effects and the ethical and moral implications for society. We can´t forget that science is just a way to help the world to become a better place, the world is not only the place for humans: the world as a whole, where we should keep the balance of the creation.
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