NewScientist (8 April 2017) reports on a fascinating development in organ replacements – implantation in not-traditional locations:
BLIND tadpoles have learned to see again – using eyes implanted in their tails.
With help from a drug usually used to treat migraines, the eyes grew new connections to the tadpoles’ nervous systems. The same approach may work in people, allowing the body to integrate organs grown in the lab.
“If a human had an eye implanted in their back, connected to their spinal cord, would the human be able to see out of that eye? My guess is probably yes,” says Michael Levin at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts.
How about an EMT with an extra eye in his finger so she can explore a wound more thoroughly? Even more so for docs. And then the exotic location community would probably pop into being. I’ll not explore that sordid thought.
And then be disappointed when they discovered these are not heritable traits.
