On average, 90% of new drugs developed by pharmaceutical companies in the U.S. fail to make it to a commercial market due to inadequacy of the current screening process.
As a result, the manufacturers and researchers involved are seeking a better alternative to up the odds of the industry’s roulette, and save money in a market with an estimated worth of over$300 billion.
最近几年，3D bioprinted organ-on-a-chip deviceshave been propagating as a promising solution. Containing live human cells, arranged as they would be in the body, the organ-on-a-chip devices are与任何实验室老鼠相比，与我们生理的匹配更紧密或灵长类动物，并避免在此过程中的残酷含义。
As such, the U.S. federal government has granted $24 million to a research consortium seeking to make an organ-on-a-chip model of the entire body. Led by researchers at the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine (WFIRM), North Carolina, the latest paper concerning the Body on a Chip project reports the success of a system connecting three of the body’s vital organs: the liver, the heart and the lungs.
Base model of WFIRM’s 3D bioprinted heart cells beating. Clip via Supplementary Materials, Scientific Reports.
The model body
WFIRM研究中的每个含器芯片都开始悬浮在专门为细胞类型的定制水凝胶墨水中。使用专有的3D生物生产剂，将含细胞的油墨写入包括血管特征在内的底物上。然后，血管通过微流体通道连接，模仿血液的作用。
Saving lives and saving money
通过使用类似血管的管子连接人体器官的三种模型，芯片项目上的人体已经确定了由常见癌症药物引起的一些意外副作用。
在多器官系统博来霉素中，通常用于治疗淋巴瘤，宫颈，睾丸和其他癌症，不仅引起肺部疤痕，而且还引起了心脏问题 - 单独在心脏模型中测试药物时所经历的效果。
WFIRM教授Aleks Skardal评论，，，，“This was completely unexpected, but it’s the type of side effect that can be discovered with this system in the drug development pipeline,”
“例如，如果您仅在肝脏中筛查药物，您将永远不会看到其他器官的潜在副作用。通过使用芯片上的多组织器官，您可以希望在药物开发过程的早期确定有毒的副作用，从而可以节省生命以及数百万美元。”
三下，九个去
在讨论中，作者指出：“尽管产生了无数的医学发现，但2D培养物未能概括体内组织的3D微环境。由器官或生物制造组织构建体组成的3D系统具有对药物和毒素的准确反应能力。”
It was also shown that each 3D bioprinted model considered in the study performed better than its two-dimensional counterpart. According to WFIRM director, Dr. Anthony Atala, “Eventually we expect to demonstrate the utility of a body-on-a-chip system containing many of the key functional organs in the human body,” meaning the team still have nine more organs to go.
WFIRM’s research is conducted in collaboration with teams in Boston at Brigham and Women’s Hospital; the University of Michigan; and in Maryland at the U.S. Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center, Morgan State University and the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.The most recent findings，，，，as discussed in this article, can be read online in the journal科学报告。
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特色图像显示了包含心脏，肺部和肝细胞的芯片系统上的WFIRM 3D生物打印体。通过WFIRM的照片
