Bioprinted Implant May Help The Paralyzed Walk Again

Medical science has not yet found a way to restore walking ability in someone paralyzed from a traumatic spinal cord injury.

Photo Insert: Using technology developed over the course of a decade in Prof. Tal Dvir’s regenerative biotechnology lab at Tel Aviv University, the implant enabled paralyzed lab mice to walk again.

Within a few years, a first-of-its-kind 3D-printed spinal cord tissue implant, made from the patient’s own cells, could make that dream come true.

Using technology developed over the course of a decade in Prof. Tal Dvir’s regenerative biotechnology lab at Tel Aviv University, the implant enabled paralyzed lab mice to walk again, Abigail Leichman reported for ISRAEL21c magazine.

A paper published the same day in the journal Advanced Science provides the remarkable details.

“It is like science fiction,” says Dr. Asaf Toker, CEO of Matricelf, the company working to bring Dvir’s groundbreaking technology to market. Two years ago, Dvir’s lab 3D-printed the world’s first miniature vascularized human heart.

Dvir and Alon Sinai cofounded Matricelf that year and it went public in 2021. On January 30, the company signed an exclusive global licensing agreement with Tel Aviv University technology transfer company Ramot to commercialize and utilize the patent for 3D-printing tissues and organs.

“With our technology, we can create any tissue we want,” Toker tells ISRAEL21c. “The first one is neural implants for people with a spinal cord injury causing paralysis.”

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