Microchip the size of a credit card, thanks to the efforts of scientists, gained the functions of the human liver. In the future, the electronic device will replace experimental animals when testing drugs.
The chip integrates the cells of the human liver taken from patients during medical procedures or from the liver intended for transplantation. Using the chip, researchers will be able to find out how the liver reacts to various medicines or study how the bile ducts work.
According to Dr. Lawrence Vernetti from the University of Pittsburgh, over time the chip analogues of all human organs will be created, from which it will be possible to create a man-on-chip. Liver-on-chipa is another step in this direction.
Scientists around the world are developing chips imitating human organs. So Mark Donovitz from the University of John Hopkins (Baltimore) is working on the creation of the intestines-on-chip with stem cells. And a group of scientists of the VISS Institute at Harvard University develop a bone marrow chip to study the impact of radiation.
Source — Pittsburg Post