How to build a lung: latest advances and emerging themes in lung bioengineering

What is it about?

There are many devastating lung diseases which still remain without a cure. The only option at end stage lung disease is transplantation. Currently approximately 4000 lung transplants occur globally per year, but transplantation success is limited. There are not enough donor lungs to meet transplantation needs and when transplantation does occur, the efficacy is low. This is partially due to the high rate of rejection of the transplanted lung by the recipient. Further complications can arise due to the required use of immunosuppressive drugs in the recipient. These and additional factors result in the survival rate of lung transplantation after 5 years of being only around 50%. New options for transplantation which add new tissue to the donor pool and/or technologies which minimize transplant-associated issues need to be explored. Lung tissue engineering (lung bioengineering) aims to combine biomaterials and ideally cells derived from the eventual transplant recipient in order to generate new lung tissue in the lab for transplantation. In this review, we aim to discuss recent advances and emerging themes in lung tissue engineering and the major challenges which need to be overcome to advance this approach closer to the clinic.

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