DURHAM, NC—Humacyte, a company engineering human-based tissue scaffolds that can be shaped in specific ways for cardiovascular, cosmetic, orthopaedic and other applications, has raised $7 million in debt funding according to a regulatory filing.

The company disclosed the funding in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Laura Niklason, a biomedical engineer at Yale University, founded the company in 2004. The company’s board includes well known Research Triangle serial entrepreneur Max Wallace.

In an interview in Technology Review in 2007, Niklason described how the technology was used to create artificial blood vessels derived from human cells. Less likely to cause tissue rejection, the artificial vessels could be useful in procedures such as heart bypass surgery, dialysis or others in which vascular grafts are used. The technology has been tested in baboons.

The technology works by taking human cells and putting them on biodegradable scaffolds shaped to different sizes. After about eight weeks, the cells are washed away, leaving behind the acellular tubes they created as they grew. The idea is that a patient’s own cells should repopulate the tubes when implanted and would be less likely to form clots.

The artificial blood vessel technology has been tested in animals, including baboons.

The company’s cell production process is patented.

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