A patient with acute-on-chronic liver failure in China has undergone a novel treatment involving the temporary use of a gene-edited pig liver to restore vital organ functions, doctors at Xijing Hospital in Xi’an, Shaanxi province, announced Wednesday. The procedure, described as a world first, represents a significant step forward in xenotransplantation and offers a potential new pathway for managing finish-stage liver disease.
The treatment, known as extracorporeal perfusion, involved connecting the patient’s circulatory system to a pig liver that had been genetically modified to reduce the risk of rejection, according to a report by China Science Daily. The pig liver, placed in a mechanical device outside the body, assumed key detoxification, synthetic, and metabolic functions for 66 hours although the patient’s own liver remained in place. The medical team, led by Dou Kefeng, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and director of the Department of Hepatobiliary Surgery at Xijing Hospital, reported sustained and significant improvement in the patient’s liver function markers during the treatment period.
The breakthrough is the result of a collaborative effort involving more than 20 departments of the Air Force Medical University of PLA, including Xijing Hospital and Tangdu Hospital. Researchers utilized a pig liver that had undergone six genetic edits, a process aimed at minimizing the immune response that typically occurs when animal organs are introduced into the human body. The liver was connected to a normothermic mechanical perfusion device, creating a cross-circulation system, the China Science Daily reported.
Following the 66-hour perfusion, the medical team disconnected the support system and reported that the patient remains in stable condition, with physiological and biochemical indicators approaching normal levels. Wang Lin, director of the hospital’s hepatobiliary surgery department, cautioned that We see still too early to determine whether the improvement will be sustained, but noted the stability observed for nearly 50 hours after disconnecting the machine is a positive sign.
This procedure differs from traditional liver transplantation in that it employs an extracorporeal life-support approach, avoiding the removal of the patient’s native organ. According to Dou Kefeng, the preliminary success of this technology marks another milestone in xenotransplantation. Similar research is underway in the United States, with scientists awaiting Food and Drug Administration approval for ex vivo pig liver perfusion, a procedure that would allow for the use of pig organs outside the body to support human liver function, according to a report from Scientific American published in October 2025.
The development comes as China faces a significant shortage of donor organs. Data from 2024 indicates that over 400 million people in China live with liver diseases, and approximately 200,000 patients are hospitalized annually for acute or acute-on-chronic liver failure. In a separate procedure at Xijing Hospital in March 2024, surgeons transplanted a genetically modified pig kidney into a brain-dead recipient, further demonstrating China’s advancements in xenotransplantation, as reported by Scientific American.
In October 2025, Chinese scientists reported a successful transplant of a genetically modified pig liver segment into a patient with cancer. The transplanted section functioned for 38 days before being removed due to complications, and the patient lived for an additional 133 days before dying from gastrointestinal bleeding, according to a study published in the Journal of Hepatology.
