Ishine N, Rubinsky B, Lee C Y
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA.
Cryobiology. 2000 Feb;40(1):84-9. doi: 10.1006/cryo.1999.2225.
We transplanted rat livers cryopreserved at high subzero temperatures with a protocol that mimics freezing in freeze-tolerant animals. The results of nine transplants show that: (a) every single transplanted liver produced bile, which suggests that the cryopreserved livers retained some physiological function; (b) eight of the animals survived between 2 and 4 h with loss of microvascular integrity which suggests that transplantation failure is related to the circulation and tests of bile production are not indicative of transplantation success; and (c) one animal survived for 5 days with an intact circulation which might be due to an unidentified technical variation or could indicate that when the circulation recovers animals with transplanted livers survive.
