Apersys AG

A critical shortage of donor livers leaves many patients with liver cancer or liver failure without access to life-saving transplants. Compounding this issue, many donated livers are discarded due to limited preservation time or poor initial quality assessments. As a result, only about one-third of eligible patients receive a liver transplant.

Researchers from ETH Zurich and the University of Zurich extended the ex situ preservation time of whole and partial human livers from just one day to an entire week and beyond. In a major milestone of the novel device, the project successfully performed a first-in-human transplantation following three days of preserving and treating a liver that was discarded by all Swiss transplant centers.

Furthering translation, Apersys AG is developing and manufacturing a liver perfusion machine designed to keep a liver alive outside of the body. This next-generation technology enables long-term preservation, continuous viability assessment, and potential real-time organ recovery, ultimately transforming previously unusable donor organs into viable options for transplantation.