Scientists invent 'bio-spleen' device that uses 'magnet' to cleanse blood

Scientists recently unveiled a device called 'bio-spleen,' which uses a magnet to cleanse the blood by bacteria, fungi and toxins.

Researchers hope that the external gadget, potentially throwing a lifeline to patients with sepsis and other infections, could be adapted one day for stripping Ebola and other viruses from blood, News24.com reported.

Acting rather like a spleen, the invention uses magnetic nanobeads coated with a genetically-engineered human blood protein called MBL.

Donald Ingber said that this treatment could be carried out even before the pathogen has been formally identified and the optimal antibiotic treatment has been chosen.

They could potentially treat patients with this bio-spleen during the most infectious, viraemic phase of the disease and reduce the amount of virus in their blood, he further added.

The device was developed to treat sepsis, or blood infection, which affects 18 million people in the world every year, with a 30 percent-50 percent mortality rate.