I-Corps: 3D Microfluidic Cell Arrays for high throughput drug screening in tumor/tissue microenvironment

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The research team has developed a prototype of three dimensional (3D) microfluidic cell arrays(microFCA) to better mimic in vivo tumor microenvironment. The co-culture of cancer cells in hydrogel and microvascular endothelial cells in simulated blood vessels has the ability to mimic the in vivo spatial relationship between microvessels and cancer cells embedded in an extra-cellular matrix. This technology, micro-tumor arrays with simulated blood vessels reconstructed in vitro in our 3D microFCA with patients' biopsy samples, can allow oncologists to test different cancer treatments at the outset and select one with the highest efficiency of targeting cancer cells with lowest toxicity to the healthy tissues. The technology will help to further knowledge of dynamic tumor responses to anti-cancer drugs systematically in cell death signaling pathways, so that the molecular mechanism(s) of action of anti-cancer drugs can be investigated in vitro across a spectrum on a high throughput platform.Further development of this technology may lead to the ability to better personalize anti-cancer drugs including chemotherapy treatment on a patient by patent basis. The non-invasive device would be used in conjunction with biopsy samples to find the most efficient anti-cancer drug. Finding the "right" treatment in initial stages of the disease could result in more effective treatments and benefits to the larger healthcare systems as it would help to eliminate the current "trial and error" method of determining which drugs are most effective. Additionally, the technology could be scaled up and adapted to test novel therapeutic agents for the pharmaceutical industry.