Paper short abstract:

This paper examines the limits of environmental reproductivity by looking at challenges scientists face when trying to grow in vitro organs through the production of microenvironments. How can the project of regenerating aging societies be a model for broader environmental and ecological issues?

Paper long abstract:

In recent years, techniques of growing bodily substances in the laboratory have been refined considerably to respond to ageing societies. They now include bodily structures with increased complexity - organoids - that are grown from stem cells. One of the central challenges to growing organoids in the lab is to create the right conditions - i.e. suitable microenvironments - so that different cell types organize into an organ-like architecture. Scientists frequently refer to the laboratory production of organoids as the self-organisation of cells that takes place in response to the microenvironment built by researchers. The notion of self-organisation points to the difficulties of producing organoids ready for public health application. It highlights a dimension of cellular growth that can never be completely determined by the in vitro setting. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork with Scottish stem cell scientists, my paper traces these laboratory practices of environment building and explores how scientists grapple with the uncertainties of cellular growth in a context of public health and regenerative medicine. What is the conceptual impetus of efforts to produce an environment in the lab in regard to questions about the environment on a broader scale? Do in vitro environments share conceptual challenges with issues such as climate change? In what ways can the project of regenerating ageing societies and its questions regarding the limits of environmental reproductivity inspire the endeavour to regenerate a damaged ecology?