Organoids are tiny bits of organs nurtured in lab glassware from stem cells. I joke about them at Halloween, when a few drops of water on tiny sponge brain and heart precursors bloom into mini-organs.
A Bridge Between Animal Models and Clinical Testing
Real organoids are a brilliant tool to investigate biological processes and test new treatments. Induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells are grown from a patient's skin fibroblast cells, providing a platform to test individualized interventions. And iPS cells are much closer to the human condition than a fruit fly, worm, zebrafish, rodent, or even a primate model.
Organoids aren't complete replicas of organs, but mimic how cells assemble into tissues of a specific organ, and how those tissues interact. They offer an increasingly important step between testing a treatment in an animal model and in people in clinical trials, saving time and funding and improving safety and efficacy.
The most recent report of a novel organoid to capture my attention is a mini human spinal cord, which researchers at Northwestern University created to model different types of injuries to test regenerative treatments. Like a spinal cord in a body, these miniature bits of humanity display inflammation, cell death, and the clumping of glial cells into impenetrable scar-like masses that can squelch nerve healing and regeneration.
To continue reading, go to DNA Science, where this post first appeared.
