It seems that this technology could be commercialized and produce significant revenue. Have you attempted to obtain funding through traditional for-profit sources? If you were unsuccessful, and other biotech firms have declined to conduct this kind of research, why do you think that is the case?
1
Growing human blood vessels in the lab to unlock replacement tissue/organ therapies
Not fundedImpact certificate
$0raised
$35,000valuation
Longer description of your proposed project
1. Fabricate a “microfluidic” device that lets you recreate the natural blood vessel formation process entirely in the lab.
2. Transplant the blood vessels grown in the device into a rat and demonstrate that the blood vessels transform into larger clinically useful blood vessels.
I’m building technology to grow human blood vessels in the lab, which will unlock a new class of therapies: large replacement tissues/organs. Replacement tissues/organs cannot be realized without the ability to grow a blood vessel network inside of them. How to make a transplantable human tissue with real blood vessels inside of it is in an unsolved problem and the major problem that is preventing replacement tissues/organs from becoming a reality. This is the problem I’m solving.
A new class of technology using “microfluidic” devices to grow tiny blood vessels in the lab was first introduced to the world in ~2013 (e.g. here: https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2013/lc/c3lc41320a). Uniquely, these blood vessels are formed by recreating the natural blood vessel formation process that occurred when we were embryos (in contrast with techniques like bioprinting that do not produce real, functional blood vessels). The problem was that the size of the tissues and blood vessels grown in these microfluidic devices were (and still are) too small to be clinically useful. They were also not transplantable. In 2016, I began working on addressing these problems as an MS student in biomedical engineering at Boston University. After 2 years of intense work, I had developed a proof of concept device that demonstrated one could scale up the size of the tissues and blood vessels grown in these microfluidic devices and make them transplantable. In essence, I solved a scaling problem. Since this work was not published, the tech has been sitting dormant. 5 years later, I still have not seen the solution I came up with published. I did move to the bay area after leaving my MS program and tried to keep developing this technology, but was unsuccessful in raising funding and subsequently struggled for several years. During that time though, I did focus on coming up with solutions to unsexy problems with the prototype device/tech I developed. E.g. how to make it more user friendly, scalable, and mass producible; how to develop the blood vessels further, what applications the tech could most immediately and realistically be used for, etc...
Once I’ve finished implementing the device improvements (which I’m actively working on now), I will grow the blood vessels to make sure it works (planning to use lab space in Santa Clara, CA) and then transplant the blood vessels into a rat to demonstrate their clinical use. If you can grow just a blood vessel a few cm long and 2mm in diameter, you can use it for coronary artery bypass surgeries. I currently have just enough money to grow the blood vessels in a lab, but not transplant them into rats. This grant would provide me with enough funding to do the transplant experiment.
Describe why you think you're qualified to work on this
I have a BS in Cell/Molecular Biology and MS in Biomedical Engineering. I have previously grown the blood vessels as an MS student to demonstrate proof of concept (see them here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1nKxm04c1A I built cheap award-winning versions of expensive equipment needed to fabricate the custom devices needed to grow the blood vessels (see here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1SXnh7JJUlj6IyZTAEnjMBE_OZvgvc-UjHR4V2265he8/edit I have 7 years of cell culture experience and 7 years of engineering/fabrication experience.
Other ways I can learn about you
https://www.linkedin.com/in/mike-ferguson-5a744160/
Please contact me if you would like to know more about this specific technology: mikef522@gmail.com I can also refer you to qualified people who have reviewed a detailed proposal of the planned experiments for an unbiased opinion as to whether or not the project has potential.
I am currently supported by funding from Z fellows, Emergent Ventures, Homebrew Bio, and New Science.
How much money do you need?
$35K minimum, $70K would be nice to account for errors.
$10K for surgeon + $21K Cost of renting Mispro facilities for 3 months + $5K for rats = $35K total (double to account for errors = $70K)
I have $30K myself, which will just cover growing the blood vessels.
Links to any supporting documents or information
Action Plan: Grow human blood vessels in lab and transplant them into rats
Fabricate microfluidic devices needed to grow blood vessels in my bedroom lab using the DIY high resolution photolithography equipment I made (see here). 1-2 months in
Fabricate a biodegradable version of the microfluidic device following a protocol similar to the one here: 10.1038/s41596-018-0015-8. 1-2 months in, parallel with step 1
Grow blood vessels in Biocurious lab in Santa Clara, CA to verify the devices work properly (and to show the blood vessels to potential investors, I already have a few people who are interested and waiting to see them). 2 months (now 3-4 months total, say 4 months)
Find and hire a surgeon as a contractor to do the blood vessel transplant experiment. (Already have a few leads on this). Done during step 3.
Sign contract with Mispro to use their facilities in Palo Alto, CA to house rats. Work with them and rat surgeon over 2-8 weeks to develop and get approval for a transplant protocol using the one described here (10.1038/s41596-018-0015-8) as a guide. Done during step 3
Order rats (budgeting for 48 rats to cover various experiments). Done between 4-5 months in.
Grow blood vessels in biodegradable microfluidic devices (takes 1-2 weeks) and transplant them into the rats at Mispro Now 6-7 months in.
Remove the transplanted blood vessels at various time points (e.g. 1,2,4,8 weeks) and characterize the size, viability, and functionality of the transplanted blood vessels and tissues via various means (e.g. perfusion assays, immunostaining, microscopic analysis and measurement, etc…). Now 8-9 months in.
Troubleshoot any problems encountered with the transplant experiment and repeat the transplant experiments as necessary (I am doubling projected transplant budget to account for this). 12 months in
If data is promising, use it to raise several million dollars to develop the technology into a viable therapy (e.g. replacement blood vessels).
Estimate your probability of succeeding if you get the amount of money you asked for
Actually carrying out the proposed work: 100%
Growing blood vessels: 100%
Successful rat transplant experiment demonstrating usefulness of the blood vessel technology: 60% chance with $100k ($70K here + my $30K), 95% chance with $200K. I’m fairly confident in the transplant experiment ultimately working, based on various prior research. Since it’s never been done before, it remains to be seen if any complications will arise and how expensive it will be to solve those.
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Mike Ferguson
8 months ago
@Jason Yes, I have talked to some VCs and yes, I was largely unsuccessful (I did get 2 angels to believe in me enough to give me $20K through Z fellows) and have since won grants such as those from Emergent Ventures and New Science. You will note that all of these sources look for “people off the trodden path”.
I would wager that credibility has been the biggest concern. The research is not published and I only have an MS degree to my name (I think I’ve done the work of a PhD student, but that’s my opinion and there’s no way for you to know that, though I guess you could look through my linkedin awards and surmise I’m reasonably smart). You have to imagine, when I was initially pitching these people, the microfluidic blood vessel technology I was talking about was extremely new. Even today, many people have not heard of it, but even more so 5 years ago. At the time, there were several new bioprinting startups and I think those got quite a bit of attention (since then, none of them have even remotely delivered on their promises despite raising tens of millions of dollars). I also think that many of the people I was talking to didn’t fully understand the technology (e.g. no bio background, or no background in the specific technology I was discussing).
Lack of a cofounder was a major concern stated numerous times. Probably for several reasons: a lot of work for 1 person, I hadn’t started a company before, control, less risk (e.g. if founder dies), etc… I think these are valid reasons, but I maintain that the risk of bringing on someone for the sake of having a cofounder is a recipe for disaster, especially when I strongly believe the technology has significant potential. Despite looking, I have not found someone I consider an ideal cofounder. Part of that is probably due to having an insufficient network. If money was not a problem, I would prefer to hire someone and work with them for a bit (say a year) and then give them cofounder equity if they were good. I think this would be a much safer way to find a quality cofounder.
I had no resources when I initially approached potential investors and I did not have the plan that is currently presented here. At least now, I have the tools and funds to grow the blood vessels to show to investors (it is my hope that this will address the credibility problem). This was very difficult to overcome given that I was working outside of academia and could barely afford rent/food when I started on this.
As for possible reasons why nobody has done what I’m doing, I think there are several. First, out of the millions of ideas one can pursue, you would have had to have had the one I had. Just from the relatively small number of people working on this problem, that’s a big limiting factor (someone just has to have the idea!). Even if you had the idea though, you’d have to do the experiment. I was actually discouraged from doing it initially as it was deemed “too risky”. Even if you did the experiment (and solved the many technical problems that arose), you would have to interpret the results the way I did to realize its potential. It’s conceivable that many people just dismiss this technology as interesting, but not having therapeutic potential or needing more research (which is what I honestly believe many people do when they encounter it). Realizing its potential and thinking of how to develop it further into a therapy requires piecing together multiple insights and experimental results from 2 different fields. Honestly, that’s extremely difficult. In some sense, one could argue I was just lucky to read the right papers. Another final reason I’ll give is that people develop tunnel vision in their own research. If you made a career out of bioprinting, you will probably just stick to that, whether or not it’s the right approach. If you’re busy trying to execute on a different idea to grow blood vessels, you might not have the time to keep abreast of the latest technologies or ther ability to divert your attention/resources to a different approach. If you’re a broad biotech investor, you certainly have less time to keep up, and even more so if you are not a biotech investor.
At the end of day, to know whether or not the technology will truly work, one just has to do the experiments. That’s what I am seeking funding for. Given the potential life saving benefits, I think it is worth throwing money at. Again, perhaps due to insufficient network, I just haven’t met the right people who would throw money at this. When I first started seeking out investors, Manifund didn’t exist, Emergent Ventures didn’t exist, Z fellows didn’t exist, New Science didn’t exist, Homebrew Bio didn’t exist. I imagine people exist that would fund this work, I just haven’t met enough of them.
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Mike Ferguson
8 months ago
@Jason It's also worth noting that some view or viewed the tech as too researchy for a startup. That's in the eye of the beholder I guess. In some sense they are right, there is a lot of research to be done. In another sense, I don't think relatively much will be needed to make something that is ultimately commerciallly useful. There are startups that work on things requiring just as much research. Assuming you could get the funding, by the time you did the research, I imagine it would be so derisked as to make investment significantly more competitive. Long time horizon required to get to product is also probably a reason, though an acquisition is an early exit opportunity for biotech startups.