The early days of transplantation

Although the fantasy of performing tissue and limb transplantation can be traced to antiquity, not until this century was the possibility of engrafting vital organs broached. The attempt began with failed kidney xenograft trials in Europe,1 followed by the first recorded attempt at a renal allograft in 1936 by the Russian physician Y. Y. Voronoy. The modern era of transplantation truly began in 1944, when Peter Medawar demonstrated that allograft rejection is an immunologic process.