St. Louis synthetic blood startup raises $800,000
St. Louis Business Journal
By Brian Robbins
June 4, 2018, 2:41 pm
A biotech startup that is developing bio-synthetic hybrid red blood cells has raised $800,000 from investors, according to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing.
KaloCyte Inc., founded in 2016 and located at 4320 Forest Park Ave. in the Cortex district, is made up of a team of researchers focused in the areas of science, engineering and medicine to deliver ErythorMer, a freeze-dried blood substitute that can be reconstituted and administered to treat traumatic hemorrhages when blood supplies are limited.
According to the company, the nanoparticle located in ErythorMer has prolonged stability at room temperature, is transportable in simple packaging and can be activated with water for immediate field administration.
The blood substitute was developed by a team of Washington University and University of Illinois – Urbana Champaign faculty, and was led by founder Dr. Allan Doctor, director of pediatric critical care medicine at Wash U.
In addition, the company is supported by a $2 million Fast Track Phase I/II STTR grant from the National Heart Blood and Lung Institute and a $3 million grant through the Congressionally-directed Medical Research Program from the United States Department of Defense.
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KaloCyte was founded by a distinguished team of researchers in physiology, bioengineering, and trauma care and is poised to deliver ErythroMer, a dried, bio-inspired artificial red blood cell, to market. ErythroMer is envisioned for use when stored red blood cells are unavailable, undesirable or in short supply. KaloCyte is supported by nearly $20M in federal grants and investor funding.