Student team devises cool device to protect donor lungs

Every minute counts when a donor organ is being transported for a transplant surgery. Historically, donor organs—usually stored on ice in coolers—have a limited window before they become unusable.

Dr. Irina Timofte, a transplant pulmonologist at UT Southwestern Medical Center, envisioned a new way to protect donor lungs in transport, and she sponsored a University of Texas at Dallas UTDesign Capstone team of engineering students to design and build the device for thoracic organ transportation.

“We are working on a better way to transport donor organs to reduce risks of complications after transplant,” said Timofte, associate professor of internal medicine at UT Southwestern. “I am so happy to have this collaboration with UT Dallas students.”

The new thoracic organ-recovery cooler controls temperature, pressure, and humidity within a sealed, sterile environment to preserve organs better. The team displayed it at the UTDesign Capstone spring expo on May 8.

UTDesign matches industry partners with student teams to tackle real-world technology projects.

The cooler is the third UTDesign project that Timofte has sponsored. Previous teams who worked with her developed and advanced new software that helps doctors better match donors with recipients and makes lung transplants faster and more efficient.

“The students are absolutely amazing, and they have excellent mentors,” Timofte said. “They’re doing fantastic work.”

Timofte spoke about the projects at the UTDesign Capstone Luncheon: Breakthrough Advances in Medical Innovations on April 9. She said the projects aim to improve outcomes and support safer, more effective transplants.

“Lungs have the highest discard rate of organs because they are so frail,” Timofte said. “If we can improve this process in any way, we can save more lives.”

The UTDesign team includes mechanical engineering seniors Carlos J. Garza, Heber Mantle, Luke Moore, Nicholas Schlak and Sebastian Talvy; and biomedical engineering senior Manha Lateef.

The Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science students said they were excited to work on the device and that the hands-on experience has helped prepare them for the job market.

“In all my interviews, employers always asked about my projects,” said Schlak, who plans to start a new job as an equipment engineer at Carlson Engineering Inc. in Fort Worth after graduation this month.

After graduation, Mantle plans to work as an equipment engineer at Texas Instruments.

“This project has been an exciting, hands-on opportunity to apply my learning in a design application,” Mantle said. “Normal classes have always involved giving right and wrong answers to questions written by an instructor. The creative freedom of this open-ended problem brings challenges that require more critical thinking.”

Talvy, who serves as the team’s leader, said working on a device for a physician gave him the opportunity to broaden his skills.

“It has been a great experience to work with someone in a different field,” said Talvy, who plans to start a job as an HVAC sales engineer at Johnson Controls in Fort Worth after graduation.

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Sadie Harley

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Andrew Zinin

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