Pigs have replaced primates as the prime candidates for xenotransplantation to humans, but the process remains experimental and controversial. In the late 20th century, scientists transplanted primates' hearts, kidneys, and livers into humans with some success. Xenotransplantation is a recent word, dating from the 1960s, but the practice (or attempted practice) has been around for hundreds of years cross-species transplants were (unsuccessfully) attempted in the 17th century. The Latin xeno- comes from the Greek word xenos, meaning "stranger" or “guest." We have a number of words in English which are built on this root, including xenial (“of, relating to, or constituting hospitality or relations between host and guest”). Robert Dixon, The degrees of consanguinity and affinity described and delineated, 1674ĭefinition - transplantation of an organ, tissue, or cells between two different species The middle portion of consanguineous comes from the Latin sanguin-, meaning “blood.” This root is also found in sanguine, a word which, confusingly enough, may be defined as “marked by eager hopefulness : confidently optimistic.” The reason for this is that an early meaning of sanguine was “having blood as the predominating bodily humor,” with humor here referring to “one of the four fluids entering into the constitution of the body and determining by their relative proportions a person's health and temperament.” If you prefer to use words in a logical etymological fashion (which is never a good idea) you may restrict your use of the word sanguine to its sense meaning “bloodthirsty” or “bloody.”Īnd my Daughter, who derives her Blood immediately from me, must needs be more Consanguineous or nearer of Kin to me than my Sister, who derives no Blood at all from me. Nowadays, we understand that ancestral contributions are not transmitted through blood but through genes contained in chromosomes. Definition - of the same blood or origin specifically : descended from the same ancestorĬonsanguineous is sometimes used to describe marriages or intimate relationships, such as when geneticists discuss birth defects in the offspring of consanguineous unions (i.e., unions between close relatives).
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