About Us

HemoShear, LLC was founded in January 2008 to help guide drug development companies in the discovery and selection of new drug candidates that have superior efficacy and safety profiles, using our proprietary, human surrogate technology. Our breakthrough technology is based upon the principal that shear stress forces from hemodynamics (blood flow) are necessary factors for human cell survival and behavior. HemoShear’s technology imposes human-derived hemodynamic forces on human primary cells to recreate their human biology. Our proof-of-concept studies demonstrate that HemoShear’s technology is far more predictive of human responses than traditional cell culture and animal testing.

The technology was co-invented at the University of Virginia by Brett Blackman, Ph.D. and Brian Wamhoff, Ph.D. Dr. Blackman is a tenured associate professor of biomedical engineering and leads a successful laboratory investigating the role of hemodynamic forces in regulating vascular endothelial cell biology in cardiovascular disease. Dr. Wamhoff is an associate professor of cardiovascular medicine and leads a successful lab that studies mechanisms that regulate smooth muscle cell biology in cardiovascular disease and injury.

In early 2008, the Company filed non-provisional and PCT patent applications with the U.S and international authorities. HemoShear’s first patent, which covers the core technology, was issued in October, 2010. The company continues to strengthen its patent portfolio with additional filings anticipated in 2010.

Through much of 2008 and into early 2009, the Company conducted a number of proof-of-concept studies of its first surrogate system of the human vasculature in order to demonstrate the technology’s ability to recreate the biology of the human artery and to reliably predict human responses to known drugs.

During the latter half of 2008 and early 2009, the Company raised two rounds of equity financing from angel investors, totaling $5 million, and leased an entire building containing 8,000 square feet of office and laboratory space in Charlottesville, Virginia. HemoShear conducts its laboratory operations, business operations, and R&D at this site.