Built to function like a human spleen, bioengineers at Harvard’s Wyss Institute have created a microfluidic device that filters pathogens from blood. Deceptively complex in its design, the biospleen consists of two adjacent, hollow channels connected by a series of deviating canals.
On one end of the device blood flows through branching channels where it’s met with a saline solution flowing from the device’s opposite end. As the two fluids come in contact, pathogens are stripped from the infected blood by a nano-bead coated in genetically engineered immune system protein.
To remove the pathogen-ridden spheres from the tainted fluid the nano-beads contain a magnetic component. Once the fluid has passed through its saline filter an opposing magnetic field can be applied to the system, pulling the beads and their pathogens out of the fluid.
In tests on human blood Wyss engineers found that their device not only filtered over 90 percent of sepsis causing pathogens, it could perform its filtering function with unprecedented speed. In fact, the artificial spleen can filter anywhere from a half to a full liter of blood in an hour – a rate that’s consistent with the best dialysis treatments.
According to Don Ingber, Wyss Institute founding director, "Sepsis is a major medical threat, which is increasing because of antibiotic resistance. We're excited by the biospleen because it potentially provides a way to treat patients quickly without having to wait days to identify the source of infection.”
After its successful tests in the lab, Ingber is hopeful the technology can enter human trials soon. "We hope to move this towards human testing to advancing to large animal studies as quickly as possible."
If Wyss’ new biospleen is approved by the FDA then soldiers, patients with weak immune systems, and the critically ill may have a new, life saving treatment at their disposal. If nothing else, Wyss’ engineers have found an economical solution to a devastating disease that has long plagued the medical community.
Image and Video Courtesy of Wyss Institute