Stem cell scientist unveil lab-grown lung

American researchers have provided some hope for the hundreds of Australians languishing on organ-transplant waiting lists.
Doctors at the Harvard Medical School have used stem cells to construct a miniature lung, which functioned for up to six hours when transplanted into a rat.
Lung transplant specialists say the research is a significant breakthrough in efforts to develop ways to expand the organ donor pool.
For the 50 million people worldwide with end-stage lung disease, the only definitive treatment is a transplant.
 It is hoped the research by the Harvard Medical School in Boston will go some way towards improving the chances of survival.
Dr Harald Ott and his team removed the cells from a rat lung and rebuilt the organ blueprint using human umbilical and foetal rat cells.
Within about a week that lung began exchanging oxygen like normal lungs and was transplanted into a rat where it continued functioning for six hours.