A device for organ and limb preservation developed at UT Health San Antonio, and being commercialized by a San Antonio startup company, is the grand prize winner in the 2019 Create the Future Design Contest.
The Universal Limb/Organ Stasis System for Extended Storage, or ULiSSES™, was developed by Leonid Bunegin, B.S., associate professor in the Department of Anesthesiology, UT Health San Antonio. The technology, which is property of The University of Texas System Board of Regents, is exclusively licensed by UT Health San Antonio to Vascular Perfusion Solutions (VPS) Inc.
Rafael Veraza, M.P.H., Ph.D., postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Anesthesiology, is assisting Bunegin in laboratory studies testing the technology as part of a U.S. Department of Defense grant. Dr. Veraza is listed on the award with Bunegin, who is chief scientific officer with VPS, and Tom DeBrooke, M.B.A., VPS chief executive officer.
Lab tests indicate that the ULiSSES™ device can preserve tissue for more than 24 hours, far longer that current methods. Extending organ and limb viability could vastly improve the numbers of successful transplants and organ replacements.
The Create the Future Design Contest was launched in 2002 by the publishers of Tech Briefs magazine to help stimulate and reward engineering innovation. There were more than 700 entries from 60 countries in this year’s competition.