Inventing the first “implantable” artificial kidney
The Kidney Project at the University of California, USA, received a $650,000 award from the KidneyX Foundation for creating the first bio-implantable kidney model, which promises to free kidney patients from dialysis machines and kidney transplant waiting lists, according to the report. Stated on the University of California website.
The KidneyX Foundation is a public-private partnership between the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the American Society of Nephrology (ASN), and was founded to "accelerate innovation in the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of kidney disease."
The Kidney Project, led by Professor Shufu Roy, Ph.D. from the University of California, and William Wessel, Professor of Medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, succeeded in integrating the two main parts of the artificial kidney project that they were working on separately, namely the “blood filter” and "Bioreactor", to make a biological kidney the size of a small mobile phone, and then move on to the next step, which is the clinical evaluation. The team received the KidneyX Foundation award as a result of this great scientific and technical breakthrough in the field of kidney disease treatment.
In the past few years, the team has successfully tested the two most important components of a biosynthetic kidney: a "blood filter" that removes waste and toxins from the blood, and a "bioreactor" that replicates other functions of the kidney.
Then the scientists combined the two units to produce a miniature version of the artificial kidney, and tested the performance of this kidney, where the two units worked together in perfect harmony with the support of blood pressure alone without the need for blood liquefaction, as is done in the processes of washing, or the immunosuppressive auxiliary drugs that kidney failure patients usually take When washing operations were carried out, which was a great success for the project, the team deserved to win the award.