A Microengineered Brain-Chip to Model Neuroinflammation in Humans

iScience (2022)

Abstract

Species differences in brain and blood-brain barrier (BBB) biology hamper translation from findings in animal models to humans. This, in turn, impedes the development of medicines and brain diseases. Researchers from Emulate developed a human Brain-Chip that contains endothelial-like cells, pericytes, glia, and cortical neurons while maintaining BBB permeability at in vivo-relevant levels. With these features, the model is able to closely recapitulate neuroinflammation, allowing scientists to gain a mechanistic understanding of cell-cell interactions and BBB function during neuroinflammation with greater accuracy than they could with conventional models of the human brain.