“Insulin, discovered in Canada 100 years ago, has saved many lives, but it’s not a cure,” said Corinne Hoesli, study co-author and Associate Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering. “We designed a device with a pre-formed network of artificial blood vessels that looks like a vascular bypass graft, except we introduced insulin-secreting cells into it.”

“This starts to look like a bona fide artificial organ,” she said, adding that a key element of success was interdisciplinary collaboration with researchers across Canada, including teams from Université Laval, the University of British Columbia, and Université de Montréal.