Kevin M Bennett
Washington University in St Louis, MO·Biomedical Engineering
Transplant kidneys save lives but are scarce: roughly 5,000 deaths a year are attributed to the gap between patients waiting and organs available. Strikingly, about 2,500 kidneys that have already been recovered from deceased donors are thrown away each year, usually after being judged "poor quality" from a single needle biopsy or from a statistical risk score called the kidney donor profile index (KDPI).
- Fields
Biomedical Engineering
Medicine & Clinical Research
Physiology
- Topics
kidney transplantation
deceased donor kidneys
organ discard
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Feb 2031
What they work on
- Validate individual magnetic resonance imaging features against histopathology scores for interstitial fibrosis, glomerulosclerosis, vascular sclerosis and tubular atrophy, using site-directed biopsies taken from imaged locations in discarded human kidneys.
- Test whether three-dimensional, multiparametric MRI can detect disease across a whole donor kidney in organs from donors with a kidney donor profile index above 85 or age over 60, compared with lower-risk kidneys.
- Apply statistical classification and machine learning to identify which combinations of imaging features best predict whole-kidney pathology in high-risk human donor kidneys.
- Determine which imaging and histopathologic features predict post-transplant function in a pig model of high-risk kidneys, using bilateral ischemia-reperfusion injury, ex vivo imaging, autotransplantation and weekly glomerular filtration rate measurement.
More about the research
Both measures are weak: disease is patchy across a kidney, so one biopsy core may miss or exaggerate it, and the KDPI is based on donor characteristics rather than the specific organ. This project develops imaging measurements that assess the whole kidney, with the goal of keeping usable organs from being discarded.
Why it matters
Thousands of recovered donor kidneys are discarded each year while patients die waiting. Imaging biomarkers that read the whole organ rather than a single biopsy core could reduce inappropriate discards, give transplant teams evidence-based tools for judging whether a high-risk deceased donor kidney will work, and expand the pool of organs available to patients with kidney failure.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Sara Lewis
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, NY·Medicine & Clinical Research
Test whether a non-contrast multiparametric MRI protocol combining T1 relaxometry and IVIM diffusion imaging can detect and stage scarring (IFTA) in transplanted kidneys, compared against biopsies.
Vishnu Potluri
University of Pennsylvania, PA·Medicine & Clinical Research·Early-career
Determine whether immunosuppression modifies the risk of post-transplant lymphoproliferative disorder in kidney recipients without prior Epstein-Barr virus infection who receive organs from infected donors, using validated data from an eight-center consortium.
Daniel Brennan
Johns Hopkins University, MD·Medicine & Clinical Research
Determine how donor APOL1 genotype affects time to graft failure, kidney function decline, acute rejection and proteinuria in recipients of kidneys from African American donors.
The school
Washington University in St Louis: 97 labs on PI Pages, $1.2B a year on research, 365 research doctorates a year.
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