京都大学 白眉センター

   One of the ultimate goals of bioengineering is to re-create natural living systems by means of synthetic biology and tissue engineering. The long-termmission of our laboratory is to recapitulate the in vivo human physiology and pathology on a microfluidic device, such as “Body-on-a-Chip” (BoC). Indeed,due to their capacity to recapitulate in vivo physiological and pathological conditions, BoC exhibit great potential as alternatives for pre-clinical animal tests to assess drug efficacy and safety. Although several chips and systems have been reported in the last decade, there are still some important issues that need to be addressed; these include: 1) the use of functional tissue cells derived from human pluripotent stem cell (hPSC), 2) the alternatives of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) to prevent chemical absorption, and 3) the integration of in situ monitoring systems to monitor cellular responses. Here, I will introduce our interdisciplinary approach of stem cell biology, material science, and micro/nano-engineering to address the aforementioned issues involved in drug discovery and precision medicine.