Doctors are currently experimenting with artificial lungs

So just how close are we to being able to create a bionic person?



LUNGS
Doctors are currently experimenting with artificial lungs as a way to give patients waiting for a donated lung an increased chance of survival.

One such device is the BioLung, a machine which is roughly the size of a drinks can that is implanted in the chest. The device is packed with hollow plastic fibres perforated with holes so tiny that only gas molecules can pass through them.

As blood filters through the fibres, carbon dioxide escapes through the holes and is replaced by oxygen from the surrounding air.

Researchers claim it can reproduce 100 per cent of normal lung function. Clinical trials are expected to be under way in the next few years.

BIONIC HAND
Not dissimilar to Will Smith's arm in the film I, Robot, in 2007 there was a bionic revolution close to home when Livingston-based company Touch Bionics introduced the first commercially available bionic hand.

LEG
Earlier this year a biotech company in New Zealand revealed that it had created a pair of robotic legs which had helped a man walk again.

The device is not an implant, but rather a robotic exoskeleton, or Rex - a pair of robotic legs that support and assist a person who usually uses a wheelchair. Users strap themselves in and control their movements using a joystick and control pad.

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