if certain organs can regrow [like livers] why can’t we just keep some on ice until they’re needed?
In: Biology
lovers can only be preserved outside of the body for up to 7-8 hours “on ice”, 12 max. they use a special chemical. i just googled
Organs do not live that long on ice. There is a reason why transplants that takes place in different hospitals use ambulances with sirens, helicopters and in some cases even fighter jets to get the organs to the destination hospital as fast as possible even if the organ is on ice. We are able to prevent it from dying for a few hours but not much longer. Therefore we can not just keep an organ on ice for long periods of time. It may be that we just have not researched the right technique but currently it is not possible.
Because organs are made up of cells, millions of cells, and these cells need to be alive in order for the organ to function and/or “regrow.” And cells die very fast without a supply of blood flow to bring oxygen and nutrients so the cells can function. Matter of hours.
Ice, and in general, freezing temperatures, will freeze the water that is inside most cells. Water *expands* when it freezes, which is why ice floats, and also why any glass container with water inside that’s left to freeze will be broken up by the ice. The ice “grows” in volume compared to the water that was previously in the container, shattering it.
Needless to say, freezing cells inflates them so much that they burst and die. “Ice” kills cells, rips their membrane/skin apart.
The current best methods that we have for preserving organs and keeping them alive, are basically reducing the temperature a little (chilled, not freezing), but mostly they’re trying to put the organ in a medical liquid that approximates blood as much as possible, with hopefully enough oxygen and nutrients in there to keep the organ alive.
It’s a [colorless liquid](https://intermountainhealthcare.org/-/media/images/modules/news/liverpump.jpg?mw=1600) (looks like medical plasma liquid actually), and again it can only manage a few hours of keeping the organ’s cells alive, then they start dying rapidly and the organ starts to fail.
Livers have a high oxygen requirement and while putting a donor organ “on ice” temporarily reduces the amount of oxygen the organ needs and reduces the degree of injury it takes, they don’t live long and the longer “on ice” the worse the state the organ will be.
After a cardiac arrest it is not uncommon to see a rise in the blood markers that indicate the liver has been damaged, and that would have been a much much shorter length of time with reduced oxygen supply.
Even using special chemicals and machines they don’t last forever, as the cells will need more than just oxygen to survive in the longer term so with our current level of technology it really isn’t feasible to keep them locked away in a time of need.
Furthermore our number of people needing transplants greatly outweighs the number of organs so there isn’t a need to store them as there’s always a growing waiting list of people desperate for a transplant.
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