Viability assays in organ preservation.

Assays to determine the viability of preserved organs ideally must meet two important requirements: (i) in the clinical environment, they should allow the surgeon to determine if an organ will be viable when it is transplanted (this needs to be done in a noninvasive, nondestructive manner, and currently no such assay exists), and (ii) in the research environment, they should aid in the development of improved methods of organ preservation. Currently, however, the only reliable means of assessing viability is actual transplantation. Many conventional biochemical and physiological techniques have been used to describe the mechanism of preservation-induced injury and to help improve preservation. This paper reviews some techniques that have been used to aid in the development of organ preservation.