Japan startup creates pigs with organs suitable for human transplants

Japanese startup PorMedTec announced on Tuesday that it has produced three clone piglets that have organs that can be transplanted to humans with less risk of immune rejection, paving the way for future cross-species organ transplants.

The piglets, which were born Sunday using cells imported from U.S biotech startup eGenesis, will be provided to medical institutions in Japan for pre-clinical research, the firm said.

PorMedTec, a spinoff of Meiji University, imported gene-edited pig cells from eGenesis in September and took their nuclei into egg cells, creating genetically modified embryos. They were then implanted into the uterus of a mother pig to produce clone piglets.