Harvard Bioscience (NSDQ:HBIO) spin-out Harvard Apparatus Regenerative Technology (NSDQ:HARTV) is launching with a bang, with its 1st major announcement touting positive 5-year results from the world’s 1st implant of a tissue-engineered bio-artificial trachea.
Claudia Castillo, who received the trachea implant at the age of 30, is "living normally without any complications or rejection of the implanted airway" 5 years later, according to a follow-up study published this month in the journal The Lancet. Castillo had lost her own trachea due to complications associated with tuberculosis.
Surgeons in Spain successfully replaced her trachea in 2008, using a tissue-engineered windpipe researchers had grown out of her own stem cells. Researchers have continued following Castillo’s progress, testing lung function and immunological response, calling results proof that the tissue-engineering method is "safe and promising."
Harvard Bioscience acquired all rights to the synthetic trachea regeneration technology, which will become the territory of spin-out Harvard Apparatus Regenerative Technology. HART’s independence becomes official November 1.
The shift will allow Harvard Bioscience to refocus on acquisitions, rather than pouring all its cash into regenerative therapies, president David Green told the Boston Business Journal.
