Doctors from a Xi'an hospital performed xenotransplantation surgery on March 25, in which the kidney of a multi-gene-edited pig was transplanted into a brain-dead human. The kidney is still functioning well 13 days later, Beijing-based Science and Technology Daily reported on Monday.
Qin Weijun, head of urology at Xijing Hospital of the Air Force Medical University in Xi'an, Northwest China's Shaanxi Province, told the newspaper that his surgical team transplanted the gene-edited pig kidney into the brain-dead recipient's body.
As of Sunday, the transplanted kidney had been functioning for 13 days, and was working well in the recipient's body, producing urine normally, Qin said.
According to Science and Technology Daily, this is another milestone breakthrough in the field of xenotransplantation for Qin's hospital, after it made the world's first xenogenetic liver transplantation from a multi-gene-edited pig into a brain-dead recipient.
