Duke Ex-Vivo Organ Laboratory (DEVOL)
The Duke Ex Vivo Organ Laboratory (DEVOL) is an integrative research laboratory exploring the transformative potential of ex vivo machine perfusion (EVMP), which keeps organs viable by pumping blood through them rather than keeping them on ice. The lab is dedicated to exploring two facets of EVMP: how it can enhance the quality of abdominal and thoracic organs for transplant, and how it can be an investigative platform for the selective study of organ systems.
Immune Management Laboratory
When patients receive an organ transplant, they must take immunosuppressive medications for life to prevent rejection. These drugs are incompletely effective and cause significant morbidity. My research is directed toward understanding transplant rejection and translating this understanding into less morbid therapies for transplant recipients.
Knechtle Lab
Two unsolved problems in organ transplantation are 1) injury caused by antibody directed at the donor organ; and 2) recurrence of autoimmune disease after transplantation. Neither of these immunologic injuries is well addressed by current immunosuppressive therapy, and both prevent successful long-term allograft function. Our laboratory works in animal models to address the first of these problems and is engaged in human clinical trials to address the second.
McElroy Research Laboratory
Dr. Lisa McElroy is an abdominal transplant surgeon with a health services research lab focused on understanding how complex health care processes and large multidisciplinary teams affect outcomes of high cost, high acuity patients.
Transplant Immune Regulation and Tolerance Lab (TIRTL)
Our research program focuses on modulating the pre-formed alloimmune response to donor antigen in sensitized recipients.
Vascularized Composite Allograft Laboratory
Vascularized composite allotransplantation (VCA) refers to the transplantation of multiple tissues, such as skin, muscle, tendon, nerve, and bone, as a functional unit (e.g. a hand, the abdominal wall). Several recent advances in clinical organ transplant immunosuppression and experimental VCA have now made it feasible to consider clinical VCA for functional restoration in patients with the loss of one or both hands or large tissue defects that may not be reconstructed with autologous tissue. Our research facilitates the translation of VCA from the bench to the bedside.