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It’s time to grow a tissue-engineering industry
Let me quote something from the Pittsburgh Tissue Engineering Initiative’s Web site:
“Biotech enterprises are on the rise in this region, thanks, in part, to the abundance of world-class universities, research institutions and health care facilities thriving in southwestern Pennsylvania. To meet these emerging needs, a coalition of local educational and economic development organizations is developing a ‘2 + 2 + 2’ life science curriculum.”
The full name of that curriculum project is the Southwestern Workforce Development Pipeline 2 + 2 + 2. Its purpose is to prepare high school students for biotechnology careers. Students take two years of biotech studies in high school, followed by two years at Community College of Allegheny County and capped by two years of baccalaureate study at a four-year institution.
Begun in 1996, the Pittsburgh Tissue Engineering Initiative is an effort to develop and nurture a tissue-engineering industry in a region that already has a strong biotech sector. PTEI involves Allegheny University of Health Sciences, Carnegie Mellon University, Duquesne University, the University of Pittsburgh and its medical center, plus local biotech companies. Pittsburgh Business Times’ “Book of Lists” has a “25 largest biotech companies” category, to give you an idea of how many biotech firms are in Pittsburgh.
We in the Lowcountry have nothing remotely resembling this initiative. The Pittsburgh folks are creating, or at least trying to create, a tissue-engineering work force while we’re still trying to create a biotech industry.
Yet even though we’re far behind Pittsburgh, it’s not too late for us to snatch a piece of the tissue-engineering action. We’ve got the makings of such an industry right under our noses.
Organs ‘R’ Us
Imagine repairing tissue-damaged organs without undergoing surgery. The doctor injects into the patient’s faulty organ healthy cells that form new tissue to fix the organ.
Or imagine using tissue cells in a kind of incubator to assemble an entirely new organ to replace the damaged one.
That’s what tissue engineering is about. And we can do it right here.
We’ve got the Charleston Bioengineered Kidney Project led by Medical University of South Carolina and Clemson University researchers. What the project entails might sound like something out of Star Trek, but apparently it is more than merely possible. We’re talking about the ability to assemble a kidney from layers of human tissue cells produced from a cell-printing device similar to an ink jet printer.
Yes, that is far out, as we said back in the day. But so was the idea of flying to the moon, once upon a time.
We have Cell & Tissue Systems Inc., a Charleston company that develops ways to cryogenically store cells and tissues to repair damaged organs. Cell & Tissue Systems still works with the company from which it separated, Chicago-based Organ Recovery Systems, creator of a portable transportation device that preserves kidneys on their way to transplant patients.
Put two and two together: the Bioengineering Kidney Project plus Cell & Tissue Systems equals the nucleus of a potential industry that produces, repairs and transports kidneys.
Throw in this nation’s strong demand for kidneys—about 60,000 patients currently in line for these organs plus the fact that more than 20 million Americans have chronic kidney disease—and you have a sizeable health care market ready to be served.
That’s just kidneys. As I said earlier, tissue-engineering technology can be applied to other organs and tissues. The potential size of the tissue-engineering market is so huge that you get a pleasurable headache thinking about it.
Invest, already!
The tissue-engineering technology is in place. The table, as it were, is nearly set.
What’s missing?
Kelvin Brockbank, president and chief science officer of Cell & Tissue Systems Inc., says the growth of a tissue-engineering industry in the Lowcountry is hampered by a lack of incubator space for fledgling companies.
Vladimir Mironov, director of MUSC’s Bioprinting Research Center, says the Bioengineered Kidney Project lacks investors.
If we’re as serious about launching a biotech industry as we say we are, we need to cut out our traditional time-wasting, side-stepping, red-tape-ensnaring shag dance and start walking the biotech walk. That means, to switch metaphors, putting our money where our collective mouth is.
Local private investors have a golden opportunity with tissue engineering. State funds could help build the facilities Brockbank says we need.
So let’s quit talking and start doing.
Dennis Quick is senior staff writer at the Business Journal. E-mail him at dquick@charlestonbusiness.com.
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