The Kidney Project: Creating a Bioartificial Kidney | Hacker News Reader

The Kidney Project: Creating a Bioartificial Kidney

pharm.ucsf.edu

37 pointsaxson9 comments

To add some sense of time and scale here, an article on the same project from 2010:

http://www.sfgate.com/health/article/UCSF-team-working-on-ar...

Bioartifical kidneys are nowadays competing with the organoid approach. For chemical factory and filter organs, the artifical organ doesn't have to look anything like the real thing in order to perform at least some of its functions.

So for example, now that researchers can forge tiny functional kidney organoids ( http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/protex.2015.087 ) they can chain these things together into useful structures for implant or use inside biomaterial enclosures.

There is definitely a spectrum between materials science and biology, with hypothetically practical devices possible at all points and the line between device and organ very blurry. The biology end is putting more competitive pressure on the materials science end these days.

"with hypothetically practical devices possible at all points and the line between device and organ very blurry."

Yes this is certainly very interesting. For someone like me who works clinicaly in dialysis care it is fascinating to follow. Will this project succeed? If so, how will the dialysis medical care change? Maybe there will be no need for dialysis in the future.

Yesterday I learnt that cats have such efficient kidneys that they can re-hydrate by drinking sea water. I wonder what would happen if an artificial kidney was capable of doing that.

Vanderbilt seems to be further along (not that it's a contest, strictly speaking, but in the interest of science, and for those who like contests): http://www.vckd.org/bioartificial-kidneys and the always-risky-university-press-office version: http://news.vanderbilt.edu/2016/02/vu-inside-dr-william-fiss... Disclaimer: I went to school with the PI

The video states that dialysis doesn't perform all the tasks of a healthy kidney. If that's the case, then wouldn't a better dialysis machine be a more logical first step? That removes the size issue from equation.

Yes, but that wouldn't take away the decline in quality of life for dialysis patients. They still would have to go to a dialysis clinic 3 times a week for treatments.

A better dialysis machine might be portable?

There is at least one portable machine on the market. http://www.nxstage.com/homehemodialysis

There are much bigger problems due to secondary infections caused by the /permanently/ implanted tubes required for regular dialysis.

The tubes also need to be frequently opened and used for self/manual dialysis that may be needed on a regular every-7-hours kind of way.

A friend of mine had his kidneys fail and he was on manual dialysis every 7 hours or something, every day, and could never miss ine. Once due to a power cut he had to drive 3 hours to get to a working microwave because he had to heat the fluid bags to body temp before using them.

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