NASA & Methuselah Vascular Tissue Challenge Winners Make History

Winners of the Vascular Tissue Challenge were announced after achieving the first milestone toward growing human replacement organs.

"Methuselah Foundation is extremely proud that the NASA/Methuselah Challenge brings us closer to the day when medicine can regenerate organs to prolong both lifespan and quality of life for people around the world," said David Gobel, the Foundation's CEO. "When we proposed the challenge to NASA in 2013, we had hoped it would result in just this kind of scientific advancement. We congratulate these talented scientists and eagerly look forward to their continued trailblazing in coming years."

The first-place winner was Team Winston from the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine, affiliated with Wake Forest School of Medicine. The team, led by Dr. James Yoo, was awarded $300,000. It will also receive $200,000 from CASIS (Center for the Advancement of Science in Space}, to fund the cost of conducting a tissue generation experiment in zero gravity. The second-place winner was Team WFIRM, also from the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine. That team, led by Dr. Anthony Atala, was awarded $100,000.

Both groups created lab-grown human liver tissues that were robust enough to survive and function like healthy liver tissue found inside our bodies. Winning entries were built using 3D printing technologies. Ongoing progress will ultimately enable physicians to 3D print human organs with a patient's unique DNA. Eleven teams competed in the Challenge to produce an in-vitro, vascularized organ tissue that is more than 1 centimeter thick. Winning tissue had to provide adequate blood flow and survive at least 30 days.

The Vascular Tissue Challenge is one of two initiatives in which Methuselah has partnered with NASA.  A second, the Deep Space Food Challenge, is a competition to create food and optimized nutrition production technologies to produce healthy, and even healing foods for long-duration space missions.