First clinical trial to test pig kidney transplants begins

Rigorous study follows 'compassionate use' experiments that had mixed results.

- BY LAURAN NEERGAARD

The first clinical trial is getting underway to see whether transplanting pig kidneys into people might save lives.

United Therapeutics, a producer of gene-edited pig kidneys, announced Monday that the study’s initial transplant was performed successfully at NYU Langone Health.

It’s the latest step in the quest for animal-to-human transplants. A second U.S. company, eGenesis, is preparing to begin its own pig kidney clinical trial in the coming months. These are the first known clinical trials of what is called xenotransplantation in the world.

To protect the study participant's identity, researchers aren't releasing information about when the surgery was performed or further patient information.