Scientists at an English university have grown a miniature artificial human liver in a major medical breakthrough. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20061031/hl_afp/britainsciencebiotech_061031133215)

Ok, that's pretty neat. They're going to use it to test drug treatments.

But I thought this was really amazing:
The pair extracted blood from the umbilical cords of newborn babies. They were then placed in a "bioreactor" developed by
NASA, which mimics the effects of weightlessness. This allows the cells to multiply more quickly.

Chemicals and hormones are then added to encourage the stem cells to turn into liver tissue.

"We take the stem cells from the umbilical cord blood and make small mini-livers," said McGuckin. "We then give them to pharmaceutical companies and they can use them to test new drugs on.

How do they mimic the effect of weighlessness?

I had been watching neo organs for a while. Nothing came up on it for years. I like the idea, it has such potential.

Now if they can grow full sized organs from a host that needs one and won't be rejected rather than just using them for drug testing.

A liver is quite a complex organ, so even a tiny one is an accomplishment.

Bioreactor (http://science.nasa.gov/NEWHOME/br/bioreactor.htm)

I'm sure Bones did this sort of thing on Star Trek. Must be good!

Of course he did it all with a little tricorder thing that had a dozen flashing lights and beeped a lot.

I'm sure Bones did this sort of thing on Star Trek. Must be good!

Of course he did it all with a little tricorder thing that had a dozen flashing lights and beeped a lot.
But if he could have done that he wouldn't have had to say, "He's dead, Jim", all the time!

He did it on Jim, maybe. Need to keep Jim alive to tell him all the red suited men are dead.

I wonder how babies "hook up" properly. They're not in a simulated gravity free environment.