Dundee R&D firm signs agreement to develop heart valve

Medical: Vascular Flow Technologies and AorTech will work on project

Dundee-based research and development company Vascular Flow Technologies (VFT) has signed an agreement with medical device firm AorTech International to develop a medical heart valve.

The 20-year-old Dundee Technology Park firm focuses on the research and development of vascular and endovascular devices. The development agreement follows VFT reviewing AorTech’s historic data, testing and designs.

The joint project involves detailed computational modelling and analysis of AorTech’s heart valve with the aim of further design optimisation, manufacturing and testing. It is hoped the work will lead to the first ‘in man’ testing of the technology.

Craig Dunlop, general manager and director of VFT, said: “The team at VFT has been very impressed with the quantity and quality of data AorTech has been able to demonstrate to us.

“We are very excited to be a key partner in the development of the next generation of prosthetic heart valves, which should represent not only a step change in performance but dramatically reduce the cost to manufacture these life-enhancing devices.”

Bill Brown, chairman of Surrey-based AorTech, said his company now had access to Europe’s leading experts in the combined field of “medical imaging, guided finite element analysis and computational fluid dynamics”.

He said: “Combining the design history with this ground-breaking imaging analysis should much improve the quality of the product design, reliability and performance.”

The next generation of prosthetic heart valves should represent a step change in performance. CRAIG DUNLOP, GENERAL MANAGER, VASCULAR FLOW TECHNOLOGIES