The DoD has awarded $3.4 million to Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston to in an attempt to advance face transplant technology. Earlier in the year, doctors at Brigham and Women’s Hospital performed America’s second face transplant, giving James Maki a new face after a disfiguring subway accident. With the new grant, the hospital will be able to perform six ot eight more operations over the next year and a half.
The research will focus on overcoming the vast technical challenges to transplanting a face. Besides the difficulty of the surgery, face transplant recipients require a complex combination of immunosuppressant drugs to keep their bodies from rejecting the new face. Since veterans are generally a young group, any soldier that receives a face transplant also sets down a course of drug therapy that will last many, many decades.
On the trillion-dollar-scale of military spending, $3.4 million doesn’t seem like a lot. But with a research field as young as face transplant surgery, any funding boost will surely help.
Popular Science has been a leading source of science, technology and gadget news since 1872. With up-to-the minute latest space news, insightful commentary on the new innovations and concept cars ...if it's new or future technology you'll find it at popsci.com.au.
WW Media - Popular Science © 2010
Gadgets - Cars - Science