Japanese startup creates pigs with organs suitable for human transplants

Japanese startup PolMedTech announced Tuesday that it has cloned three piglets with organs that can be transplanted into humans with less risk of immune rejection, paving the way for future xenotransplants.

The company said the piglets were born on Sunday using cells imported from U.S. biotech startup EGenesis and will be provided to medical institutions in Japan for preclinical research.

In September, Meiji University spin-off PolMedTech imported gene-edited pig cells from EGenesis, incorporated their nuclei into egg cells, and created genetically modified embryos. They were then implanted into the sow’s uterus to produce cloned piglets.