Repair of damaged organs in vitro.

Treatments that can be performed ex vivo following ischemia to accelerate cellular recovery and ameliorate reperfusion injury could have major impact. An acellular, near-normothermic perfusion was employed to deliver growth factors to ischemically damaged kidneys. During the treatment oxidative metabolism was sufficiently restored to support up-regulation of cellular processes with the potential to modulate both injury and repair proteins in damaged kidneys. The results suggest that growth factor administration, without concomitant inflammation, triggers pathways for new synthesis leading to cellular recovery rather than cell death.