The goals of this project represent the culmination of more than two decades of 3D bioprinting innovation by Chen and his lab. Together, the team has developed a technology capable of rapidly fabricating high-resolution biological tissues with complex, multi-cellular structures in just seconds rather than hours.
Chen and his team have recently integrated artificial intelligence into the design and manufacturing process to help engineer sophisticated vascular networks. This, Chen explained, is one of the key challenges in scaling up from small tissue samples to full-sized, living organs.
Through this new initiative, the team will now apply these cumulative advances to tackle their most ambitious goal yet: bioprinting a life-sized, transplantable human liver.
If successful, Chen said, the project could provide an on-demand source of functional liver tissue for transplantation, potentially saving the lives of more than 12,000 patients in the United States each year who are currently on the transplant waiting list. The approach could also significantly reduce healthcare costs and improve long-term outcomes for patients with chronic liver disease.
“For decades, the transplant community has dreamed of a future where the fate of thousands of patients each year is no longer determined by the scarcity of donor organs,” said Gabriel Schnickel, professor of surgery at UC San Diego School of Medicine, chief of the Division of Transplantation and Hepatobiliary Surgery at UC San Diego Healthand co-investigator on the project. “This work has the potential to fundamentally change countless lives by moving that vision from aspiration to reality.”
Other UC San Diego co-investigators on the project include David Berry, Ahmed El Kaffas, Padmini Rangamani, Bernd Schnabl and Claude Sirlin at UC San Diego School of Medicine, and Rose Yu at UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering.
The researchers are collaborating with Allele Biotechnology, an industry partner with expertise in personalized stem cell generation technologies and methods to efficiently produce different types of cells needed to bioprint livers for transplantation. The San Diego company, founded by its CEO Jiwu Wang, also owns specialized facilities for cell manufacturing that meet regulatory standards. Together, the team plans to advance the process from laboratory-grade to clinical-grade production.
