DEVELOPMENT OF A HYBRID ARTIFICIAL ORGAN

THE GOAL OF THIS STUDY IS TO DETERMINE THE FEASIBILITY OF USING A DENSE, SEMIPERMEABLE POLYMER MEMBRANE FOR IMMUNO-ISOLATION OF FOREIGN TISSUE IN A HYBRID ARTIFICIAL ORGAN. A SERIES OF POLYMERS WILL BE SYNTHESIZED AND CHARACTERIZED FOR PERMEABILITY, CYTOTOXICITY AND BIOSTABILITY. THE POLYMER COMPOSITION/MORPHOLOGY WILL BE VARIED TO YIELD A SERIES OF POLYMERS WITH STEPWISE INCREASING PERMEABILITY. MEMBRANES WILL BE CAST FROM SOLUTION ONTO RELEASE LINER, USING A LABORATORY WEB COATER UNDER UNIFORM CONDITIONS OF AIR FLOW AND THERMAL HISTORY. THE SAME CASTING SOLUTION WILL BE USED TO PREPARE SMALL-DIAMETER, HOLLOW-FIBER MEMBRANES FOR USE AS CELL PACKETS FOR MOUSE IMPLANT AND INVITRO CELL GROWTH EXPERIMENTS. USING A SERIES OF PERMANENT SOLUTIONS, THE PERMEABILITY OF THE FLAT IMPLANT AND IN VITRO CELL GROWTH EXPERIMENTS. USING A SERIES OF PERMANENT SOLUTIONS, THE PERMEABILAITY OF THE FLAT MEMBRANES TO WATER, GLUCOSE AND SEVERAL PROTEINS WILL BE MEASUREDD IN A NON-STEADY-STATE DIFFUSION EXPERIMENT. SENSITIVE CALORIMETRIC/STAINING METHODS WILL BE USED TO QUNAATIFY GLUCOSE AND PROTEINS WHICH PERMEATE THE MEMBRANES FOR CALCULATION OF PERMEABILITY COEFFICIENTS FOR SELECTED PERMANENT/MEMBRANE PAIRS. IN PHASE II WE WILL BUILD AND IMPLANT HYBRID ORGANS WITH PROTECTIVE, SELECTIVELY-PERMEABLE BARRIERS FOR CULTURED AND/OR GENETICALLY ENGINEERED CELLS. IN PHASE III THE MEMBRANES DEVELOPED IN PHASE II WILL BE OFFERED COMMERCIALLY BY OUR LICENSEE AS (COMPONENTS OF) HYBRID ARFIFICIAL ORGANS.