Salman Khetani: How can we safely test drugs and chemicals

In today's world, how can we make sure the many chemicals we encounter are safe?

"There are roughly 40,000 chemicals currently active in U.S. commerce, the vast majority of which have never undergone comprehensive safety evaluation - and most people are routinely exposed to dozens or hundreds of them through air, water, food and consumer products," said UIC researcher Salman Khetani. "Every time you smell new-car smell, you're inhaling dozens of industrial chemicals off-gassing from plastics and adhesives - and on a hot summer day, some of those compounds exceed safety limits."

Over nearly 25 years, Khetani has developed tools that enable scientists to safely and accurately mimic human tissues. His group uses techniques such as microfabrication and 3D bioprinting to create liver, heart, intestinal and lung tissues for applications spanning chemical and drug testing and regenerative medicine.

"With human cells, we're engineering tissues that we can screen drugs and chemicals on for toxicity or efficacy," said Khetani, who is the Robert Uyetani Collegiate Professor in the College of Engineering. "We make them more like what's happening in the body with our engineering and biological techniques."

Khetani's focus has been on the liver and creating tissue models to study drug-induced liver injury, hepatitis B infection, metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (formerly known as non-alcoholic fatty liver disease), and the impacts of alcohol use. He began studying the liver while pursuing his PhD in bioengineering at the University of California San Diego. There are many liver diseases, but few cures for them, Khetani said.

"Every year, thousands of patients with end-stage liver disease are placed on a transplant waiting list, and while most will eventually receive a donor liver, roughly 2,000 Americans still die waiting each year because demand continues to outpace supply," said Khetani.

Over the past decade, Khetani's research group has also applied their techniques to cardiac, intestine and lung tissues.

"Many of the engineering techniques we use and the way we approach the problem are absolutely relevant to these other organs for things like atrial fibrillation and lung fibrosis," he said.

As part of a recently announced $15 million grant from the NIH's National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, Khetani will use his tissues to test the effects of the many industrial chemicals we encounter every day.

"We will then create a database and work with partners to use AI to predict what a new compound that's being developed might do to human health," he said.

Khetani said he is grateful for the collaborative strength of the College of Medicine.

"UIC has an amazing medical school that collaborates with engineering very seamlessly," Khetani said. "I've benefited tremendously from being able to work with physicians and physician scientists who have a deep knowledge of pathophysiology and patient outcomes."

And nothing could be done, he said, without the UIC students he works with in his lab. "Without their talent and resilience, I don't think I would be where I am."