Organoids - Organ Mimicking

Our bodies have multiple organs that perform specific tasks, and proper functioning of all the organs in the body is very-very important as we know quite well. Mimicking organs in a lab is cutting edge medical research area that could bring a revolution. It could bridge a gap between in-vitro (the experiments that are done in glass tube, outside the living organisms) and in-vivo (experiments that are performed on living organisms) experiments, open avenues for personalized medicine, disease modelling, treatment of fatal diseases like cancer and could be useful in understanding human organs development. Organoid is a name given to an organ made in a lab. Figure 1 is a picture of Organoid. Our organs are made up of different types of cells that are in layers or in a network. To create a three-dimensional tissue or Organoid, researchers identify, decode and understand the molecular signals that allow the stem cells to differentiate in the embryo or adult tissue. It is claimed that researchers have successfully cultured the organoids of brain, thyroid, thymus, liver, pancreas, stomach, lungs, kidneys and early embryos.

Figure 1: Illustration of Organoid (Source: Ref. 3)

Organoids experience same mutations as the original cells taken from a diseased tissue of the patient. They can reproduce an anomaly that is genetically unique to an individual. This could be very important especially in personalized medicine and in understanding how different patients respond to treatments especially in the case of Cancer. Also for the clinical trials of drugs, Organoids banks are created. Furthermore, Organoids could also reduce the need for animal testing if not replacing it completely.

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland is pioneer in this cutting edge medical research domain and Dr. Matthias Lütolf’s lab specializes in stem-cell biology and bioengineering is leading the initiative.

By: Ms. Parul Datta, Assistant Professor (CSE), Chitkara University, H.P.

References

1. https://actu.epfl.ch/news/organoids-mimicking-our-organs-in-the-lab/
2. https://actu.epfl.ch/news/what-purpose-do-organoids-serve/
3. https://www.rndsystems.com/products/organoid-and-3d-culture-reagents