Miniature organs mimic human body

• Autores: Jessica Hamzelou
• Localización: New scientist, ISSN 0262-4079, Nº. 3170, 2018, pág. 16
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • Ten miniature models of human organs have been linked up to create the closest we have yet come to a human-on-a-chip. Such systems may eventually replace animal testing. Linda Griffith at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology her team have linked up 10 such organs to mimic the human body. First they connected their models of the lung, gut and endometrium to a liver chip. Once this was working, they added brain, heart, pancreas, kidney, skin and muscle models. All the organ tissues survived for the four weeks they were tested, says Griffith. The organs-on-chips also produced similar proteins to real human organs. When a common painkiller called diclofenac was applied to the gut chip, the other chips responded similarly to human organs.