A novel Liver & Brain multi-organ-chip model : rapid and reduced cost pre-clinical safety drug screening

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Cell culture involves the growth of living cells in laboratory conditions without using animals in order to gain better understanding of body function, disease or to develop new drugs. Conventionally, cells are grown in 2-D glass or plastic surfaces such as Petri-dishes and plates, and are normally cultured in isolation, ignoring multiple cell types important in maintaining tissue function. However, no cell lives alone in the human body and creating multiple cell type tissue models are essential to mimic the true nature of organ specific function and improve research and drug discovery.Researchers across many sectors, including the pharmaceutical industry, research organisations and universities apply conventional cell culture for the growth and testing of mammalian cells. Cell culture has played a vital role in many life science discoveries such as the development of new drugs or vaccines. However, the results often lack relevance when tested in patients as the cell growth is constrained within the available 2-D surface when compared to true three-dimensional (3-D) complex multicellular environments of living tissue.Drug-induced liver injury (DILI) and neurotoxicity are leading causes of drug failure during development and post-market drug withdrawal. There is a need for a more predictive tools to assess liver and neurotoxicity risks early in drug discovery. Human cell-based laboratory models for pre-clinical safety screening are increasingly being developed as alternative methods to animal testing.Revivocell Ltd is developing a novel Organ-on-a-chip (OOAC) cell culture platform, that can better simulate the environment for cells to enhance their function, for example as a liver in an _in-vitro_ setting. Existing 3-D cell culture technologies aiming to promote liver specific functionality are expensive, difficult to use and are not easily adaptable for different experiments and cell types.This technology has the potential to increase the success rate of developing new treatments and reduce the reliance on animal testing. The objective of this project is to assess the feasibility of a newly developed OOAC technology to mimic the liver and neuro-specific microenvironment. Revivocell's invention will provide a reliable, fast and cost effective device that could be used worldwide