The implantable bioartificial kidney from The Kidney Project promises to free kidney disease patients from dialysis machines and transplant waiting lists, as it works by emulating a healthy organ.

The new bioartificial kidney took another big step towards becoming a reality, by winning a $ 650,000 prize from KidneyX for his first demonstration of a functional implantable prototype.

KidneyX is a public-private partnership between the United States Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the American Society for Nephrology (ASN). founded to “accelerate innovation in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of kidney diseases”.

In this sense, The Kidney Project results from the association of the creators of the new bioartificial kidney, led by Dr. Shuvo Roy, from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), and William Fissell, from the Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC). ).

Both combined the two essential parts of the artificial kidney, the hemofilter and the bioreactor, and were successfully implanted into a smartphone-sized device for preclinical evaluation.

For this breakthrough, the team received the KidneyX Phase 1 Artificial Kidney Award and was one of six winning teams selected from an international field.

The discovery of The Kidney Project does not come overnight, because successfully tested the hemofilter, which removes waste products and toxins from the blood, and the bioreactor, which replicates other kidney functions, such as electrolyte balance in the blood, in separate experiments.

For the occasion of artificial kidney award (Artificial Kidney Prize) that motivated the advance, the team joined the two units in a reduced version of the artificial kidney and evaluated their performance in a preclinical model, forming what is now the first bioartificial kidney.

In the exercise of putting in the units worked together, fed only by blood pressure and without the need for anticoagulants or immunosuppressive drugs.

“The vision of the artificial kidney is to provide patients with a full mobility and better physiological outcomes than dialysis, ”said Roy, who is also a faculty member of the Department of Bioengineering and Therapeutic Sciences, a joint department of the UCSF Schools of Pharmacy and Medicine.

The new bioartificial kidney “promises a much higher quality of life for millions of people around the world with kidney failure,” also known as end-stage renal disease, leading to the progressive and dangerous loss of kidney function.

In these cases, most kidney failure patients must visit dialysis clinics several times a week to have their blood filtered, a time-consuming, uncomfortable and life-threatening process.