1900 – 1949

Hedon discussed plasmapheresis where he auto transfused body-own erythrocytes into rabbits

Ullmann performed first successful kidney transplant, a dog autotransplant and a dog-to-goat xenograft

Ehrlich studied transplantation of tumors in mice without determining the response to transplants of normal tissue

Jensen perceived that that the failure of tumor homografts was an immune reaction

Guthrie advocated cooling to protect donor organs before transplantation

Jaboulay performed the first two renal transplants in humans using a pig donor for one and a goat donor for the other

Fleig reported first therapeutic approach of apheresis with autotransfusions with washed blood cells in toxemia and hetero transfusions in anemia

Schӧne, considered the first transplantation immunologist, determined that homografts always failed and that subsequent grafts from the same donor failed more rapidly than the first

Carrel is awarded Nobel Prize for originating both vascular suturing and its use in organ transplantation

Abel, Rowntree, and Turner described the principle of hemodialysis, used cellulose tubes, hirudin for anticoagulation in dogs

Abel, Rowntree, and Turner studied the effect of plasma removal in dogs and created the term “plasmapheresis”

Murphy showed that resistance to tumor homografts was dependent on  the lymphoid system

Richards and Drinker reported on the use of a screen oxygenator for perfusion of isolated organs

McLean and Howell discovered the anti-coagulant heparin

Carrel introduced tissue culture

Haas performed the first clinical hemodialysis on 5 patients using a modification of the Hopkins artificial kidney

Lim and Necheles used heparin as an anticoagulant

Gilbert, Tzanck, and Negroni described plasmapheresis applied in humans 

Necheles developed the first “sandwich” artificial kidney using a biological membrane consisting of calves’ peritoneal membrane and dialyzes dogs

Dale and Schuster described a double perfusion pump for pulmonary and systemic circulation; Gibbon subsequently uses this pump for early laboratory development of a heart-lung apparatus

Brukhonenko and Tchetchuline maintained temporary function of guillotined dogs’ heads using donor lungs for gas exchange and a bellows-type pump for blood circulation

Loeb determined that the strength and timing of rejection of skin in rats was governed by the extent of genetic disparity of donor and recipient homograft and eventually that the lymphocyte was involved

Lindbergh’s pump used for preservation of organs for as long as 3 weeks

Voronoy performed the first human-to-human kidney transplant

DeBakey described a dual-roller pump and a bellows-type pump for transfusion of blood; these devices subsequently became the most widely used blood pumps for clinical cardiopulmonary bypass and hemodialysis

Thalhimer introduced cellulose tubing for hemodialysis

Demikhov used an extracorporeal assist device for 5.5 hours to substitute for the cardiac function of a dog

Gibbon reported successful total cardiopulmonary bypass in experimental animals using a vertical rotating cylinder oxygenator

Thalheimer performed the first hemodialysis of a dog using cellophane membrane and heparin anticoagulation

Gross performed the first successful ligation of a patent ductus arteriosis

Murray used for the first time heparin in human patients

Kolff develops rotating drum artificial kidney and applies it clinically in acute renal failure patients

Kolff and Berk observed blood oxygenation through cellophane membranes in their artificial kidney

Tui, Bartter, Wright, and Holt were first to carry out plasma separation using centrifuges

Alwall develops the first stationary drum artificial kidney and the first artificial ultrafiltration kidney capable of negative pressure and hydrostatic ultrafiltration

Murray develops a stationary drum artificial kidney

Kolff’s first surviving patient with his artificial kidney was Mrs. Schaffstadt

 Fine and Associates reported successful peritoneal irrigation in a patient with severe anuria who survived after 4 days of continuous peritoneal lavage

Bjӧrk extended the limit of circulatory arrest in experimental animals by perfusion of the brain with blood oxygenated in a rotating disk oxygenator

Thomas introduced silicone as a defoaming agent for blood

Weiner envisioned neural prosthesis

Sarnoff and colleagues demonstrated maintaining adequate ventilation with percutaneous and transcutaneous electrodes

Olson at the Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in collaboration with Kolff built multiple re-designed rotating drum artificial kidneys, the Kolff-Brigham Dialysis Machine, and shipped around the world

Bakken founded Medtronic as a medical equipment repair shop

Jongbloed oxygenated blood in rotating plastic spirals

Medawar and Billingham showed that skin grafting between chimeric bovine fraternal twins was the key to understanding tolerance

Skeggs and Leonard developed the first practical flat-plate dialyzer and used it clinically

Sewall and Glenn built a precursor to the modern artificial heart pump and successfully bypassed the heart of a dog for over one hour