Mission Statement & Goals

Our present research seeks to produce controlled delivery of hydrogen sulfide to a donated heart, and ultimately determine the cardioprotective effects of such a delivery mechanism, and of hydrogen sulfide, in myocardial preservation for transplantation. This could be a potential method of prolonging heart storage and ultimately expand the pool of available organs for transplantation.


Although the benefits of hydrogen sulfide for organ storage have been demonstrated in previous research, the potential advantages of slow, continuous release of hydrogen sulfide through hydrogels, in combination with the clinically established University of Wisconsin solution, has not yet been investigated.


Project Scope

As of January 2009, there were over 100,000 patients awaiting an organ transplant. However, there were only 1,170 donors and only 2,357 transplants. There is a massive shortage of available organs for those who need new organs.


In order to address this issue, the team will focus on extending the viability of donor organs through new techniques in storage, specifically the heart. Currently, hearts are limited to a mere four to six hours of viable storage time, due to the limitations of the common cold storage method and the problem of ischemia-reperfusion injury.


The team will utilize hydrogen sulfide, which has been shown to induce hibernation in live mice, to induce such a state of protective hibernation in donor hearts to prevent ischemia-reperfusion injury. In order to maximize the protective effect of the hydrogen sulfide, microspheres will be loaded and perfused through the heart so as to achieve uniform distribution through the heart.


Gemstone Program A. James Clark School of Engineering University of Maryland
Gemstone Program A. James Clark School of Engineering University of Maryland