Media contact: Savannah Koplon, skoplon@uab.edu
Jayme Locke, M.D.
Transplant Surgeon, Director of UAB’s Comprehensive Transplant Institute and Director of Incompatible Kidney Transplant Program
Marnix E. Heersink School of Medicine
Areas of expertise:
- Xenotransplant
- UAB Kidney Chain
- Living kidney donation
- Kidney paired donation
- Desensitization and incompatible kidney transplantation
- HIV-positive kidney transplant
- Health services research
- Healthcare policy and reform
Researchers led by Locke successfully transplanted two genetically modified pig kidneys inside the abdomen of a brain-dead human individual after removing the native kidneys in the first peer-reviewed, published research of this type of transplant. The transplanted kidneys filtered blood, produced urine and, importantly, did not reject. The paper, published in January 2022, approximated the steps that might be taken in a Phase I xenotransplant clinical trial.
Locke is an abdominal transplant surgeon who specializes in innovative strategies for the transplantation of incompatible organs, disparities in access to and outcomes after solid organ transplantation, and transplantation of HIV-infected end-stage patients. Her research interests include xenotransplantation, complex statistical analysis and modeling of transplant outcomes and behavioral research focused on health disparities. Locke currently holds an NIH K23 Career Development Award and a Clinical Science Faculty Development Grant through the American Society of Transplantation, and frequently presents her research findings at international transplant meetings, including the World Transplant Congress, the British Transplantation Society, the American Transplant Congress and the National Kidney Foundation.
She has been selected for the prestigious James IV Traveling fellowship, which aims to promote communication and collaboration in the surgical community. She also has received the American Transplant Congress Young Investigator Award, the Birmingham Business Journal’s Top 40 Under 40 and was named one of Al.com’s 2015 Women Who Shape the State.
Video interview:
Media appearances:
- Kidneys From a Genetically Altered Pig Are Implanted in a Brain-Dead Patient, New York Times
- Doctors Perform First Gene-Edited Pig Kidney Transplant Into a Human Body, ABC News
- Strangers donate a kidney to strangers to grow the nation’s longest living-donor kidney chain, Nightline
- UAB surgeon selected for prestigious fellowship, Birmingham Business Journal