Artificial placenta or womb for extremely preterm babies
A research idea: keep a very premature baby in a fluid-filled bag, with its blood oxygenated through the umbilical cord by a machine, so that its organs can keep maturing without air breathing. In 2017 a team supported fetal lambs this way for up to 4 weeks and reported normal growth, lung maturation and brain growth. This atlas records no human study.
- Idea
- In this atlas
Overview
Technical summary
Idea, early feasibility in animals only. The study (Nature Communications 2017; open-access copy PMC5414058, CC BY) has a Corrigendum that adds a patent to the competing interests and changes no result; both were read. The authors give the problem as extreme prematurity being the leading cause of neonatal mortality and morbidity in the developed world through organ immaturity and iatrogenic injury, and say earlier extracorporeal systems had limited success. No human use, trial or approval is recorded here.
Hypothesis
Hypothesis, not a result. Nothing here has been demonstrated.
Supporting an extremely preterm fetus in a closed fluid circuit, with gas exchange through the umbilical vessels by a pumpless oxygenator, could allow organs to mature without exposure to ventilation.
- Maturity
- Early feasibility
- Rationale
- In lambs developmentally equivalent to the extreme premature human infant, the system supported the animals for up to 4 weeks with stable haemodynamics and normal growth, lung maturation and brain growth and myelination (abstract).
- Proposed test
- No human test is recorded in this atlas.
Objections
- The evidence is in lambs, not human infants.
- Earlier extracorporeal systems had achieved limited success, the abstract says.
Claims and evidence
Context Fetal lambs supported in an extra-uterine system (animal study)
- Recipient
- No clinical recipient
- Population
- Fetal lambs described as developmentally equivalent to the extreme premature human infant, supported in an extra-uterine device for up to 4 weeks. This is an animal study; no human infant took part.
- Care setting
- Laboratory animal study
- Geography
- Not stated in the abstract
- Life stage
- Fetal lambs (animal), not a human life stage
- Follow-up
- Support in the device for up to 4 weeks; growth, lung maturation, brain growth and myelination assessed.
Eligibility: 1 inclusion criterion; exclusion criteria not stated
- Included
- Fetal lambs developmentally equivalent to the extreme premature human infant
- Excluded
- None stated
In a 2017 study in Nature Communications, a system with a pumpless oxygenator circuit connected to the fetus of a lamb through an umbilical cord interface, kept within a closed amniotic-fluid-like circuit, supported fetal lambs described as developmentally equivalent to the extreme premature human infant for up to 4 weeks. The authors report that the lambs on support maintained stable haemodynamics, normal blood gas and oxygenation parameters and patency of the fetal circulation, and, with appropriate nutritional support, showed normal somatic growth, lung maturation and brain growth and myelination.
Source problem. A cited source is corrected. Check the sources before relying on this claim.
Applies to No clinical recipient- Fetal lambs described as developmentally equivalent to the extreme premature human infant, supported in an extra-uterine device for up to 4 weeks. This is an animal study; no human infant took part.
- Laboratory animal study
- Not stated in the abstract
- Fetal lambs (animal), not a human life stage
- Certainty method
- Not assessed
- Limitations
- An animal study, read from the abstract of the open-access (CC BY) copy. No human use is recorded in this atlas. PubMed links a Corrigendum (a published erratum), which was read: the correction adds a patent to the Competing interests statement and does not change a result. It states no human outcome and no long-term outcome of the lambs after the support period.
- Last checked
- 2026-10-15
- Next evidence check due
- Not scheduled
Sources and citations (2)
-
Supports An extra-uterine system to physiologically support the extreme premature lamb
- Locator
- Abstract, sentences 3 to 6
- How it applies
- The device and what the lambs showed.
- Retrieved
- Source effective date
- Not reported
- Source state
- Corrected
- Snapshot hash
c0e17ed290b77fe929f75ae93d30da098dae0cb461073361f047d12218d36d7b- Reuse basis
- PMC Open Access subset article under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The article's own <permissions> states the licence. The XML is committed unaltered, with the citation and licence kept in the file. The raw file is committed at research/snapshots/mn-pmc-PMC5414058.xml.
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Background Corrigendum: An extra-uterine system to physiologically support the extreme premature lamb
- Locator
- Corrigendum, body
- How it applies
- What the published correction changes.
- Retrieved
- Source effective date
- Not reported
- Source state
- Current
- Snapshot hash
ba81fcd08da245cdcba945e3b5ee1a31b4ab94806d7b854b74ba3e0a43d2f24f- Reuse basis
- PMC Open Access subset article; the article's permissions element gives a Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The XML is committed unaltered at research/snapshots/mn-pmc-PMC5457507.xml.
Record details
- Record id
maternal:idea-artificial-placenta- Content hash
5176d0d1fb5e4bab1d039825b45b3f71a64856d0c7218150126b18d610f373c9