A research team led by Professor Takenori Takebe of Osaka University has created a miniature liver using human iPS cells. The miniature liver has a three-dimensional structure of about 0.5 millimeters. Improved symptoms were noted when the liver was transplanted into rats. Clinical studies are planned after confirming the safety of the liver.

Additionally, a research team led by Professor Daisuke Yabe at Kyoto University Hospital has also begun a clinical trial for type 1 diabetes using Langerhans (pancreatic) islets produced from human iPS cells formed into a sheet and transplanted into a patient's abdomen, In February 2025, a sheet measuring several centimeters square were transplanted into the abdomen of a female patient in her forties, and the patient has since been discharged from the hospital. The research team is currently transplanting the sheets into two further patients and is aiming to put the technique into practical use in the 2030s.

Another research team, led by Professor Jun Takahashi at Kyoto University's Center for iPS Cell Research and Application, has been conducting treatment of Parkinson's disease using nerve cells produced from iPS cells. These nerve cells, which produce dopamine, were transplanted into the brains of patients with Parkinson's disease. The team announced that the treatment was effective and safe after the cells had been transplanted into seven patients. However, the researchers say they will continue to conduct trials in stages because the patients who showed significant improvement were relatively young and the number of trial subjects is small. Sumitomo Pharma, a pharmaceutical company that has been collaborating with the trials, says that having seen the results it will apply to the government to manufacture and sell the products.
(Kyoto University Center for iPS Cell Research and Application 2025/4/17 and others)

A research team from Osaka University and Kyushu University have created baby mice from two male parents using iPS cells. The procedure involved the natural (spontaneous) extinction of the Y chromosome from the XY chromosome of the male germ cells produced by iPS cells to produce germ cells with only the X chromosome. Repeated replication of the germ cells produced ova with XX chromosomes. The ova were fertilized in vitro with male sperm, and the parents produced seven male offspring. Two of them were able to produce a subsequent generation.
(Asahi Shimbun Online Edition 2025/3/19, and others)

A 53-year-old woman, Towana Looney, who received a pig kidney transplant (and here) at New York University Langone Medical Center on November 25 last year developed rejection symptoms on April 4, 130 days after the transplant. The cause of the rejection was that she suffered an infection and immunosuppressants were therefore withheld. Ms. Looney survived and was switched to dialysis. The pig kidney, named the UKidney, was created jointly by United Therapeutics and its subsidiary Revivicor, and contains ten specific genes edited using genome editing technology.
(NYU Langone Health 2025/4/5)