The transplant came after about a decade of earlier studies and transplants by Wang and his team of gene-edited organs from pigs into monkeys, including a pig heart, kidney, cornea, and bone. The group also performed a skin transplant using gene-edit pig skin into a person with severe burns.

Chinese researchers are reporting new steps in the quest for animal-to-human organ transplants. Researchers at Xijing Hospital in China say a pig kidney transplant recipient continues to recover nearly three weeks after that surgery.

These advances have made it possible for scientists to create pigs with organs that are more compatible with human biology, thus reducing the chances of rejection. One common edit, for instance, removes a pig’s ability to produce alpha-gal, a sugar that the human body doesn’t make.