The −4°C Solution: How Supercooled Kidneys Could Crack the Organ Transplant Crisis

The Big Idea

Last week, a team of researchers at Texas A&M University slid pig kidneys into a cooling device that dropped them to −4°C — well below the freezing point of water — and kept them there for days without a single ice crystal forming. Then they transplanted those kidneys back into pigs. The organs worked. In fact, they worked better than kidneys that had spent the same time on ice. Kevin Myer, president and CEO of LifeGift, an organ procurement organization, called the work "a...