Plot spoiler warning:  Not needed here, as the method in my science techno-thriller, A REMEDY FOR DEATH, takes a very different approach to human-life extension (or “life-renewal”) than mentioned in what’s to come.

“Xenotransplantation” (an experimental technology which we do not  use in A Remedy for Death) involves transplanting animal cells or even whole organs into humans to replace what isn’t working. According to this article in more than 200 pig to human xenotransplantations been performed in Russia, New Zealand and other countries. Not in Japan yet, and not clear on the United States.

To clarify, in most of those experiments the organs (or stem cells, etc.) have earlier been implanted in the carrier animal, so what comes across is –for example–a liver grown in the animal, but a liver made from human cells.

We have in fact  covered multiple related issues in this blog, among them those you’ll see at the bottom of this page. (At the moment I’m having trouble inserting links here  today–so much for the limitations of technology!)

In any case, this new article  ( http://www.the-japan-news.com/news/article/0004283766 ) refers to work on growing special pigs for the specific purpose of serving as bearers for growing organs for transplantation to humans, using especially clean environments (even as the fetuses are removed from the uterus of a mother pig), and special checking for viruses that might be carried harmlessly in the small pig but be dangerous to humans.