Surgeons in Spain have successfully transplanted a bioengineered human airway into a 30 year old Columbian woman with a collapsed left main bronchus, caused by tuberculosis. The new airway, bioengineered from a donor trachea, was used to replace the woman’s diseased bronchus on 12 June.

A report in the Lancet describes the woman as fully recovered, with normal lung function, a good quality of life, and no complications (2008 Nov 19, doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(08)61598-6). She takes no immunosuppressant drugs, the graft is functioning normally, and there are no signs of rejection.

Claudia Castello is the first recipient of the new kind of graft, developed by a European team of scientists from Bristol, Padua, and Milan. They …