German 'Skin Factory' Uses Foreskin From Babies To Grow Human Skin Samples

Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute in Stuttgart recently created the "Skin Factory," an advanced piece of lab equipment designed to use foreskin taken from babies to grow patches of human skin that can be used in the place of animals to test products, the German Herald reported.

According to a spokesman for the Institute, the groundbreaking equipment may be able to eliminate animal testing altogether and, if developed on a larger scale, could be useful in developing treatments for cancer, pigmentation diseases, and certain skin allergies.

So how does the miracle machine work? First, it's heated to roughly 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, the temperature of the human body, according to the German news outlet The Local. Next, robotic hands meticulously extract cells from foreskins donated to the project, all samples of which must come from boys age four-and-under.

"The older skin is, the worse the cells function," Andreas Traube, an engineer at the institute.

Scientists then take the cells extracted from the foreskin (one sample can provide up to 10 million cells) and incubate them inside tubes, where they multiply hundreds of times. The cells are then mixed with collagen and connective tissue to create skin about 5 millimeters thick. All in all, Traube explained, the process takes about six weeks -- about the same amount of time it takes skin to grow naturally.

"We can't use the machine to speed up the process; biology needs time to take its course," Traube told the The Local.

At least one organization within Germany has already expressed measured approval for the machine.

"I think the idea is a good one. I believe cells from artificially cultivated skin are indeed comparable with real skin," Rolf Homke, spokesman for the German Association of Research-based Pharmaceutical Companies, told The Local. "I do think it might take a few years to get up and running though. There are complicated international safety standards, these procedures can't just be changed overnight."

As such, European authorities have yet to authorize the Skin Factory for use in product testing. In the meantime, scientists are continuing to develop the machine and are producing skin at a rate of 5,000 samples per month.

Comments

[Xtrnl]

06:14 AM on 04/24/2013

This is so sad. Basically, it's proof that society cares less about boys than animals. I really hope one day we as a society will wake up to this barbarism and ban it, thereby finally giving boys the same rights girls are afforded.

[Xtrnl]

06:11 AM on 04/24/2013

This is so sad. To see such undeniable truth that baby boys have fewer rights than animals, and to see the utter apathy in the comments. I really hope one day boys will be protected from forced circumcision,. If the person didn't consent, leave their junk alone for heaven's sake!

[TLCTugger]

12:44 AM on 12/23/2011

No baby ever donated his foreskin. Jail these researchers.

[misanthropicmonkey]

11:02 AM on 12/23/2011

I'm sure they're not ripping the foreskin off of innocent babies; they probably just accept donations from those who have been circumcised. If you're mad about that blame the parents, not the researchers. Personally, I think this is a breakthrough that could pave the way for the elimination of animal testing.

[Lmurwood]

10:52 PM on 12/22/2011

Ewwww! I'm against genital mutilation for all genders. Not your body, not your choice.

[Connor Wisnom]

01:55 PM on 12/22/2011

so the Germans use the foreskin of Jewish babies to repair themselves? another one of their atrocities it seems.

[Watching rock grow]

11:19 AM on 12/22/2011

Good!

[olitenup]

10:33 AM on 12/22/2011

Good to hear! It means less abuse for animals.

[92102]

07:32 PM on 12/23/2011

Sure, leave the bunny alone, just torture the baby human boy.

[olitenup]

10:13 AM on 12/27/2011

The bunny has no choice, Parents, have a voice and a choice. If you don't want to circumcise your sons, then don't. Isn't that easy?

[lini4545]

10:20 AM on 12/22/2011

While I don't condone circumcision, I'm glad something good is coming from it.

[intactive]

05:02 PM on 01/14/2012

(At the risk of Godwin) Soap.

[carnivaluv]

08:30 AM on 12/22/2011

Wow, thats wild!

[KOTFrank]

07:57 AM on 12/22/2011

This article lacks this key element. Males are having their sex stolen for science experiments and lessor means are available. (China uses stem cells from inside cheeks.) The foreskin is the most jam-packed skin of sensory receptors of the male. The sexual receptors of course are not developed in boys four and under. These are still stem cells. Value $1,000. Lessor aged foreskins sell for as little as $300. "Donated foreskin"? Are males four and under signing consent forms and marking off the their tax write-offs for "donating" their foreskin? Someone is profiting...beware.

[Frederick Rhodes]

07:04 AM on 12/22/2011

Forced infant prepuce excision surgery in replacement for education on hygiene causes conflict and disension. It may take some generations, but the consequences won' be worth it. Just like the consequences of shooting chimpanzee mothers and taking their infants away to do experiments on them caused HIV in the human population 100 years+or- later, this ill-thought-out mengelation of innocent men as infants may lead to another ethnic cleansing, genicide, or hollow-cost, as it has in the past. There are other studies that already show it is unnecessary to use infant prepuces for stem cell production, but someone is ignoring this to try and justify religious, ritual and routine unnecessray surgery. There is another company called Foregen using ones own stem cell regeneration techniques in an attempt to regenerate the growth of ones own prepuce.

[Joe in CA]

06:05 AM on 12/22/2011

The German article tries to pretend like human testing is somehow better than animal testing. What if instead of "discarded baby foreskins" they were using "discarded baby labia?"

If WHO, UNAIDS etc. played their cards right they might be able to secure an endless supply of baby girl parts to experiment on from Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei. You know, since they sunat their girls anyway, better not to let all that infant flesh go to waste.

Absolutely sick and disgusting.

[Watching rock grow]

11:18 AM on 12/22/2011

Your plea falls flat... girls are traditionally older than 4 y/o the maximum age accepted currently. Due to it being more a passage into womanhood, not in celebrating the birth of a male.

[intactive]

03:17 PM on 12/22/2011

Wrong. See http://aandes.blogspot.com/2010/04/circumcision.html

[rjwnz]

05:15 AM on 12/22/2011

The US Pediatric Society and The Center for Disease Control both currently state on their websites, and have for a long time, that circumcision is NO prevention for disease and that it is NOT recommended.

Most western countries, including the USA, Canada, Australia and the UK, and all the rest, are signatories to a UN agreement on Child Humans Rights in which it states that a child has the right to live free of genital mutilation and that it is a human rights violation.

ALL the stories about disease prevention et al are now being discovered to be generated by the advertising departments of the medical companies who makes the cutting equipment. ALL infant circumcision is driven by profits, even the rabbis who chew them off, its how they pay their rent, of course these people are going to say whatever they want to make sure they get their $.

The grand daddy of class action lawsuits is coming, and I for one will be very happy when it does.

[KOTFrank]

08:20 AM on 12/22/2011

The USA did not sign the UN Rights of the Child so they could keep on cutting the genitals of boys only. Furthermore, California passed a law legalizing any cutting of boys, AB768. This law is currently being fostered federally HR2400. Poll vote "Oppose" at https://www.popvox.com/bills/us/112/hr2400.

[eyeforeye42]

04:45 AM on 12/22/2011

They used it to replace missing eyelids on a small child and now the parents are suing stating their kid is c ock eyed!

[majornutt2]

07:44 AM on 12/22/2011

LOL

[carnivaluv]

08:29 AM on 12/22/2011

Hahahaha

[StrawHat]

01:16 AM on 12/22/2011

@ cable1977:

1) I didn't come onto this thread to play "Dueling URL's" with you. I have zero interest in copying and pasting a dozen links from PubMed to refute your links from PubMed. I have reviewed the literature to my satisfaction and concluded that there is no RATIONAL reason to circumcise infants. If adult males want to review the literature and make an informed decision based on their family history and current research about risk, then they are of course free to do so, but to force the mutilation on infants in general is irrational, cruel and unnecessary.

2) Removing the breast buds of infant girls is not analogous to removing the entire penis. Your claim is that foreskin removal provides a (minuscule) protection against cancer. I was merely pointing out that removing the breast buds of female infants who test positive for the breast cancer genes would provide GREATER protection against cancer than circumcision but we don't do that because it has not been a customary religious practice over the past several thousand years. Even though it would be MORE protective, it seems creepy, invasive and we prefer to wait for the young woman reaching maturity before we offer her such an extreme preventative measure. I assure you that if no one on earth had been circumcised before 1990, we would NOT be snipping off baby boy's foreskin to prevent cancer today based on the few studies that show a tiny but questionable statistical benefit.

[cable1977]

07:16 PM on 12/22/2011

"I have zero interest in copying and pasting a dozen links from PubMed to refute your links from PubMed."

Yes, the usual denialist screed.

"I have reviewed the literature to my satisfacti­on and concluded that there is no RATIONAL reason to circumcise infants"

I'm curious what your ability to read and assess the literature actually is, especially that which would make your opinion more valid than the Cochrane group? Do you have much medical training? It is quite obvious that you came to that conclusion, but that doesn't mean that it is correct. The fact is that there is clear rational evidence to allow for an individual to make such a decision for their child. You will note that I never claimed that children SHOULD be circumcised, only that your arguments were extreme and not supported by the facts.

[cable1977]

07:17 PM on 12/22/2011

"Your claim is that foreskin removal provides a (minuscule­) protection against cancer."

And also reduction of risk of acquisition of sexually transmitted diseases. I wasn't hinging the benefits on reduction in risk of cancer alone, it was a part of a larger package of potential benefits. But you chose to only focus on one potential benefit.

"I was merely pointing out that removing the breast buds of female infants who test positive for the breast cancer genes would provide GREATER protection"

Except that you missed a whole part of the point, the one about benefits and harms.

I am well aware you aren't interested in much of anything apart from using appeals to emotion along many other logical fallacies, propaganda, and rhetoric to convince others of your views. You aren't interested in acknowledging any reality other than the one in your mind, which is why I have place most anti-circ advocates in the same category as AGW denialists, anti-vaxxers, and creationists. And folks like yourself wonder why you don't convince more people.

[intactive]

07:24 PM on 01/02/2012

"And folks like yourself wonder why you don't convince more people. " No we don't. We are convincing more, day by day.

"And also reduction of risk of acquisitio­n of sexually transmitte­d diseases. ... potential benefits."

Potential indeed when babies don't have sex, and men can protect themselves from STDs by a variety of other means including not sleeping around. And there are plenty of studies showing no such reduction in the real world.

"Against logic there is no armor like ignorance " How very true!