A Skolkovo resident company is about to unveil one of the world’s most advanced 3D bioprinters, thrusting Russia to the frontier of regenerative medicine.
A bioprinter is a machine that fabricates human cells, a technology that could revolutionize modern medicine by providing everything from skin grafts to replacement organs.
The Moscow-based firm 3D Bioprinting Solutions, a resident of Skolkovo’s Biomed cluster, is presenting its 3D bioprinter to the public at the Open Innovations forum in the Russian capital October 14-16.
Mironov next to the bioprinter at the 3D Bioprinting Solutions lab in Moscow. Photo: 3D Bioprinting Solutions
“Our global mission is to find solutions for a huge swathe of people who need to repair compromised organs or require transplant in the event of organ failure,” says Vladimir Mironov, the laboratory's director of science.
A traditional problem with transplants is that the patient’s own immune system interprets the new tissue as a threat and rejects it. Bioprinting reduces this risk by using the patient’s autologous cells as blueprints to fabricate tissue or entire organs.
The technology is still finding its feet: Only around 14 bioprinters have been developed since 2006, when the technology was first patented in the United States by San Diego-based Organovo.
Mironov says the Russian technology is unique.
“Our bioprinter is multifunctional. That is, it has the capacity to accommodate all known methods and approaches to 3D bioprinting,” Mironov says.
The bioprinter works by distributing so-called tissue spheroids, or bio-ink, in successive layers in a kind of scaffold structure made of hydrogel. The gel is washed away, leaving behind three-dimensional tissue that matches a computer design down to the individual cell..
According to a September 2014 report by global tech research firm TechNavio, the worldwide market for 3D bioprinting can be split into the relevant technologies: Ink-jet bioprinters; valve-based cell printers; laser-assisted cell printers; and magnetic levitation bioprinters.
The United States currently leads the world in 3D bioprinting, the report said. The Russian company said the current world market is worth $3.6 billion, and growing fast.
A major factor contributing to market growth is the growing demand in the drug discovery process. The report said 3D bioprinting techniques “reduce the time required” for new medication to be found.
“Drug discovery is a very expensive process, which in many cases will end in rejection by regulatory authorities. 3D bioprinting helps to reduce the time required for the drug discovery process, reducing complications related to human trials and lowering the expense of late stage failure,” the report said.
Another factor driving demand is the potential for organ transplantation, the report said. Hundreds of thousands of people die each year never having reached the top of donor organ waiting lists.
The Russian government is planning to make special indications on ID documents stating citizens’ willingness to donate their organs after death, the RIA Novosti news agency reported in early September.
The agency said the number of organ transplantations in Russia has doubled over the last seven years, totaling 1,400 in 2013. That is just one-sixth of the total number of organs needed, with the average number of patients on the waiting list last year hovering at 9,000, RIA Novosti reported.
Mironov’s company predicts that complete organ replacements are still more than a decade away, and that providing replacement skin tissue is a more immediate application of the technology - though even that is at least four years off.