[Brian_Baldwin]

READ MORE ON THIS HUGE BREAKING MEDICAL ACHIEVEMENT AT SOURCE URL LINK ABOVE

[central_va]

Wow, something NOT invented by a white male. Rare. /sarc

Everything is race now, get used to it.

[JRandomFreeper]

Ummmm. I'd rather have an SSD directly interfaced to my brain in the space where my left kidney and spleen used to be. I mean, the right kidney seems to be just fine, and I'm a little weirded out about the thought of not-me biology inside me. Large chunks of silicon are fine, though.

/johnny

[umgud]

Cost and availability could make this huge. I would hope it becomes both viable and pletiful.

[mojito]

This is huge news. If the lab tests are successful, I hope this life-saving invention can be brought to market quickly.

[ken5050]

Amazing...I wonder if it will first be approved overseas, rather than the 10 year or so process the FDA takes..and figure that if it sells for, say $5,000, about $2K of that will be to cover the potential liability costs..

[Pete from Shawnee Mission]

“He believes the artificial kidney could last for decades and require no pumps or batteries. Patients wouldn't require anti-rejection drugs (as is required after transplants) either because there would be no exposed natural tissues for the immune system to attack.”

If this happens this would be incredible; no more waiting for someone who matches your tissue to die; no more anti-rejection drugs, no more dialysis. Yep. It is huge.

[central_va]

This might put the illegal organ people out of business.

[Talisker]

Large-scale trials on animals and humans are expected over the next five years.

Let it be implemented through TSA - they'll use the same safety standard as they did for their naked database scanners, and we'll have access to the artificial kidneys tommorrow.

[Bean Counter]

Now that is some outstanding news! I have no doubt there will be plenty of volunteers standing in line waiting when they start human trials. If this works it could be one of the biggest medical inventions ever.

[decimon]

All wee wee ping.

Clinical trials in five years is not the best of news but it looks like this device should be.

[exDemMom]

I must admit, I wonder about issues like long term safety of the materials used to make the device. People develop allergies and sensitivities... which would complicate matters.

The animal testing is all fine and well, but animals tend not to live very long, so I’m afraid only short term/acute effects would show up in the animal testing, not chronic effects that might become an issue after several years.

I do like the fact that actual kidney cells are used... those can come directly from the patient, so should not, themselves, cause issues.

It’ll be interesting to see what comes of this.