Law-Grown Rat Kidney

Scientists have bioengineered a functional kidney from the remaining cellular matrices of a rat kidney covered with kidney and blood vessel cells from newborn rats, and implanted the grown kidney into an adult rat where it successfully filtered blood and produced urine.

Encoding Data in DNA

Scientists have successfully encoded data using nucleic acids as a storage medium -- including all 154 of Shakespeare's sonnets, historic video clips and modern texts and photographs -- allowing massively greater capacities than current methods for archival material and storage lifetimes that could last for millennia under optimal conditions.

Biodegradable Electronics

Researchers have developed flexible electronic components composed of conductive magnesium and biocompatible silk that can dissolve in water and inside the human body, enabling the design of medical implants that do not require surgical removal.

"Cyborg" Tissue Created

Researchers have grown rat neurons, heart cells and muscle cells on a three-dimensional scaffold of conductive nanowires and silicon sensors, creating viable tissues with embedded electronics that can provide real-time biometrics to monitor the health and activity of these tissues and possibly deliver commands or instructions.

Prosthetic Retina Encodes Sight

Neuroscientists have developed a prosthetic retina that works to partially restore sight in mice by pre-processing the visual signals detected and encoding them electronically according to how a healthy retina responds to stimuli before sending the signal to the brain.

Fingertip Circuit Enhances Touch

Engineers have designed a flexible circuit sandwiched into a "nanomembrane" of polyimide plastic and mounted on a silicone shape to be worn over the fingertips to provide electrotactile stimulation for the wearer, enhancing the sense of touch for the wearer for a variety of applications.

Artificial Jellyfish from Heart Cells

Researchers have built a free-swimming artificial medusoid from a silicon base and heart cells harvested from rats, complete with synchronized contractions controlled by electric current that resemble the swimming motion of a live jellyfish.

Bacteria Form Electrical Grids

New research shows bacteria and other microbial life can use conductive minerals in the soil as electrical grids, allowing for the transfer of electrons necessary to produce and consume the chemicals they need to survive.

Biological Magnetic Storage Media

Scientists have extracted the protein certain strains of bacteria use to convert absorbed iron into magnetic nanoparticles and have applied that biotechnology to the production of magnetic mass-storage media with capacities far greater than current industrial chemical methods.

Ferroelectricity in Amino Acid

Researchers have detected the first proof of ferroelectricity in the simplest known amino acid, glycine, a rare property for biological materials that may lead to a new field of bioelectronic devices and biological interfaces with conventional electronics.

Computers from Bacteria and DNA

Scientists have successfully constructed some basic computational logic gates out of gut bacteria (E. coli) and modified DNA that function just as their semiconductor counterparts, suggesting the feasibility of biological computers.

Electronic Brain in Rat

Researchers have successfully implanted an electronic device in the cerebellum of a rat with brain damage that allows it to function normally, detecting sensory information from the body, interpreting it and communicating that information directly to the brain stem.

Proton-Based Transistor

Scientists have developed a proton-based transistor using the organic compound chitosan that could potentially communicate electronic signals via ion exchange with living tissue, providing a direct interface with implications for biological sensing or prosthetics.

First Synthetic Windpipe

Surgeons in Sweden have carried out the first synthetic organ transplant, growing a new windpipe from a patient's own stem cells over an organic scaffolding and successfully implanting it into a 36-year-old man.

Laser Produced by Living Cell

Using a light-emitting protein obtained from a jellyfish, scientists have engineered human kidney cells that produce a focused and intense green light when bathed in blue light between two microscopic mirrors that act as a "laser cavity."

Laboratory-Grown Urethras

For the first time, researchers have used a body's own cells to build custom urethras to replace damaged tissue in five male patients by growing a combination of smooth muscle cells and endothelial cells in a laboratory on a biodegradable scaffold.

Human Liver in Lab

Whole miniature human livers about the size of plums have been grown in a laboratory environment from biological scaffolding of ferret livers stripped of native cells and replaced by human liver cells, a large step forward toward the goal of growing full-sized, personalized replacement livers for transplant patients.

Glucose Biofuel Cell

An implantable biofuel cell has been successfully test in a rat, drawing its power supply from the natural glucose and oxygen available in the body and producing a significant amount of electrical energy while the subject suffers no ill effects.

Heart Paced with Laser

Researchers have found that pulsed laser light can pace the contractions in an embryonic avian heart with no apparent damage to tissue, which may lead to a new generation of pacemakers and neonatal devices.

Lungs Grown and Transplanted

Researchers have taken diseased lungs from a rat and, with a process of chemical washing to reveal the organ's underlying scaffolding and then incubation in a biological slurry of lung cells, have successfully regrown healthy, functional lungs that were subsequently implanted back into the original rat.