FTIR Spectroscopy of Allograft Perfusate Separates DCD and DBD Donors: Early Results
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Sofia Carrelha
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Anibal Ferreira
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Blood and Transplantation Center of Lisbon, Instituto Português do Sangue e da Transplantação, Alamedadas Linhas de Torres, n◦ 117, 1769-001 Lisbon, Portugal
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NOVA Medical School, Faculdade de Ciências Médicas, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, 1169-056 Lisbon, Portuga
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iNOVA4Health—Advancing Precision Medicine, Núcleo de Investigação em Doenças Renais, NOVA Medical School, Faculdade de Ciências Médicas, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, 1169-056 Lisbon, Portugal
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NOVA Medical School, Faculdade de Ciências Médicas, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, 1169-056 Lisbon, Portugal
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NOVA Medical School, Faculdade de Ciências Médicas, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa
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iNOVA4Health—Advancing Precision Medicine, Núcleo de Investigação em Doenças Renais, NOVA Medical School, Faculdade de Ciências Médicas, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa
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Nephrology, Hospital Curry Cabral, Unidade Local de Saúde de São José
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Hepato-Biliary-Pancreatic and Transplantation Centre, Curry Cabral Hospital - Local Health Unit of S. José - Lisbon, Portugal
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Hepatobiliopancreatic and Transplantation Center, Curry Cabral Hospital, Unidade Local de Saúde de São José
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ISEL—Instituto Superior de Engenharia de Lisboa, Instituto Politécnico de Lisboa
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Institute for Bioengineering and Biosciences (iBB), The Associate Laboratory Institute for Health and Bioe-conomy-i4HB, Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), Universidade de Lisboa (UL)
Academic Editor: Madhu Basetti
Abstract: Background: Rapid, objective phenotyping of donor organs is an unmet need in kidney transplantation, particularly when comparing donation after circulatory death (DCD) with donation after brain death (DBD). We tested whether Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectra of the static cold-storage preservation solution collected from kidney allografts capture discriminative biochemical signatures of donor type.
Methods: Perfusates from Celsior-preserved kidney allografts (n=10; 5 DCD/ 5 DBD) were analyzed in the Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy mid-infrared (Amide I and fingerprint regions). After standard quality control and normalization, spectra underwent routine derivative processing. Supervised classifiers were trained and assessed with cross-validation to evaluate discrimination between donor types.
Results: FTIR spectroscopy of perfusate revealed donor-type signatures. Pipelines combining derivatives with non-redundant feature selection consistently improved discrimination. The fingerprint region outperformed Amide I. In cross-validation, models achieved high performance, with area under the curve up to 0.84–1.00 and accuracies up to 1.00 within this pilot; the best pipeline reached perfect in-cohort discrimination.
Conclusions: Perfusate FTIR spectroscopy provides a rapid, economic label-free readout that could complement pump parameters and metabolomics during organ perfusion. Given the small, matched pilot and heterogeneous spectral quality, larger, standardized, multi-site studies with rigorous internal validation and assessment of instrument/site transferability are required before clinical deployment.
Keywords: FTIR spectroscopy; kidney transplantation; perfusate; donation after circulatory death (DCD); donation after brain death (DBD); donor phenotyping; spectral fingerprinting; machine learning; label-free diagnostics; organ preservation