Name: Transplant cells, not organs
Uploaded: 2011-04-15T18:47:00Z
Duration: 16 min 9 s
Description: Pioneering surgeon Susan Lim performed the first liver transplant in Asia. But a moral concern with transplants (where do donor livers come from ...) led her to look further, and to ask: Could we be transplanting cells, not whole organs? At the INK Conference, she talks through her new research, discovering healing cells in some surprising places.

Susan Lim: Transplant cells, not organs

Transplant cells, not organs

Pioneering surgeon Susan Lim performed the first liver transplant in Asia. But a moral concern with transplants (where do donor livers come from ...) led her to look further, and to ask: Could we be transplanting cells, not whole organs? At the INK Conference, she talks through her new research, discovering healing cells in some surprising places.

The shortage of donor organs has left thousands waiting and dying each year, yet new science points to a radically different future. Stem cells, even harvested from something as common as body fat, offer hope for repairing damaged tissues without the need for risky, controversial organ transplants. Early research already explores restoring vision to millions and healing damaged hearts with cells, not whole organs. As medicine shifts from replacement to repair, the promise of cell therapy grows ever closer to reality.