NWO Open Competition Domain Science-XS grant won by Ana Martins Costa

Ana Martins Costa received an NWO Open Competition Domain Science-XS grant for the project "Development and validation of artificial red blood cells: In-air microencapsulation of a novel oxygen carrier".

Patient care worldwide depends on scarce human blood, and the testing of medical devices (e.g. oxygenators, dialyzers) still relies on human or animal blood. A scalable, universal, and long-term stable artificial blood has long been searched. Current approaches using mammalian hemoglobin and perfluorocarbon carriers suffer limited availability, adverse effects, environmental concerns, and poor production scalability.

We propose an innovative approach to develop artificial erythrocytes:

1) using commercial marine worm hemoglobin as oxygen-carrier,
2) selecting in-air microfluidics to fabricate core-shell-microcapsules that mimic erythrocytes,
3) setting medical device testing as intermediary goal, more feasible, but still with high impact to medical industry.