Customer Reviews

The Xeno Chronicles: Two Years on the Frontier of Medicine Inside Harvard's Transplant Research Lab

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G. Wayne Miller is a journalist with a keen interest in the personal and professional lives of medical pioneers, who are little known outside their field. His past books include King of Hearts and The Work of Human Hands, both of which recount the day to day experiences of pioneers in the field of surgery.

In The Xeno Chronicles, Miller documents the behind-the-scenes activities of Dr. David H. Sachs, a legend in transplantation research. Dr. Sachs is determined to advance the field of cross-species transplants, known as xeno-transplantation. Miller gained exclusive access to Harvard's transplant research laboratory where Dr. Sachs and his colleagues attempt to harvest genetically modified pig organs and transplant them into baboons as a first step into animal-to-human transplants. With an ever increasing number of people needing organ and tissue transplants, and the immature promise of stem cell research, xeno-transplantation could be a saving grace for millions around the world. But Sachs's work, and the work of his counterparts, is being slowed down by politics, animal activism, and above all, financial constraints.

Miller does a wonderful job in not only focusing on the scientific work of Dr. Sachs, but also by touching-up on stories of animal activism and financial hardships experienced by animal research scientists. Patients who are desperately waiting for an organ believe that animals are the last chance they have at life, but activists think animals deserve the full respect bestowed on us humans and should not be used as spare body parts. This is why animal research scientists have become similar to undercover agents, proceeding through a plethora of security checks and biometric checkpoints to reach their labs. The corporate firms backing the research impose further restrictions on open scientific discussions, and many believe such restrictions slow down the progress of xeno-transplantation, if not all of medical research.

The Xeno Chronicles reads much like the latest best-seller novel, with complex characters, heroes applauded by some and criticized by others, and a sophisticated plot of secret research and political mongering. But this story is not fictional; it is in fact the real life drama of scientists on the fringe of medical greatness.

Scilitera.com

It seems like the more progress we make, the more we realize just how much we don't know.

Transplanting animal organs into people sure sounds like a good idea, doesn't it? It's been tried for decades with invariably disastrous results; the "Baby Fae" debacle, mentioned in this book, is by far the best known.

I'm deducting a star for the way the book seems to drop off a cliff, with a hint of propaganda.

OTOH, like other G. Wayne Miller books, it remains a good story with interesting and colorful characters.

G. Wayne Miller's The Xeno Chronicles: Two Years On The Frontier Of Medicine Inside Harvard's Transplant Research Lab focuses on Dr. David Sachs, a pioneer in immunology who has made many contributions in the field of organ transplants. His real passion lies in xenotransplantion: using animal parts to treat and replace human parts, and The Xeno Chronicles here examines his decades of work and the genetically engineered, cloned pig Goldie designed for organs which are not rejected by recipients. From limits of research money and time to moral and ethical concerns, The Xeno Chronicles does an excellent job of keeping a fast pace and a scientific eye on Dr. Sachs' promise and progress.