This machine keeps transplant livers alive for a week

With current technology, a human liver donated for transplant can only be kept alive for 24 hours, and often, if the liver is damaged or diseased, it cannot be considered for transplant. That could soon change. Liver4Life, a Wyss Institute project, h...

Researchers create lung ‘blueprint’ that could aid organ regeneration

Serious lung disease has a high rate of mortality, and the only curative treatment is a lung transplant. This is a complicated procedure that has other adverse health effects and oftentimes simply doesn't work, so for scientists in this field, organ...

Scientists bioprint living tissue in a matter of seconds

Bioprinting holds great potential for repairing injuries, testing drugs or replacing whole organs, but it's currently limited in complexity, viability and speed -- you can't just create tissue on a whim. Soon, though, it might be a matter of craftin...

Guy Builds a Singing Furby Organ to Haunt our Dreams

Furbys may be fun for kids of a certain age, but to the rest of us they are slightly terrifying. Now they’ve become even more nightmarish in the hands of Sam Battle, the hacker and musician behind the YouTube channel Look Mum No Computer. He hacked together 44 Furby toys to build the world’s first singing Furby organ. I will be seeing this when I close my eyes tonight. No sleep for me.

While I’m impressed at Sam’s technical expertise, to be able to build something like this, what the hell has he unleashed onto the world? Watching this Furby choir and hearing their nightmarish wails just feels like I’m watching a scene from a new Gremlins movie. Like maybe they got together in a church to sing some songs before they torch the place with everyone in it.

Sam had to lots or rewiring and create custom software so that each toy would respond to commands from the keyboard, and produce specific notes and vowels on-demand. Ohhhhh, their high-pitch squeal… This is the soundtrack of a trip to hell and these sounds will stay with you all day. Hey, I had to hear it, so you do too.

[via Digg via Sploid]

Scientists ‘hack’ cells to create 3D shapes from live tissue

Never mind 3D-printing organs -- the real dream is to make the tissue itself bend to your will, and UCSF scientists have managed just that. They've discovered that they can 'hack' special cells that help fold tissue (mesenchymal cells) to create 3D...