This editorial of Nature could perfectly be the kick-off of the Organ-on-a-Chip technology. This new market is still in definition and we don’t even have a clear precise definition of Organ on a Chip. In Europe, the consortium Orchid is planning to write a “white book” about it during the next years, so possibly we will be able to have soon all the rules about this new trend.
Petri dishes have been used for more than a century for cell culture, and yet we had to wait until the beginning of the 21st century to hear some voices calling for a change in cell culture. In flat dishes, cells are cultured in 2D, which is very far from their behavior in the human body. Consequently, three dimensions were needed to reproduce most of the activities that occur in vivo. Furthermore, researchers have discovered that some cells behave entirely differently in 2D compared to 3D, often becoming false positives in the laboratory when compared to clinical trials conducted in humans or animals.
In 2003, the possibility of working in 3D seemed unrealistic due to costs and technological limitations. However, nowadays, it is quite affordable to work in three dimensions, even incorporating flow, which addresses another major issue with the Petri dish—lack of stimuli. Nevertheless, a revolution like this requires time to convince researchers. Even so, in this particular case, the benefits are so evident that it is only a matter of time before a global transition occurs in the cell culture sector. Ultimately, this shift will lead to a technology that makes experimentation much more efficient than ever before.
Goodbye Flat Biology Congress
One of the most popular congresses of the sector is now called Goodbye Flat Biology, possibly as a tribute to this prediction of Nature, being the beginning of the Organ-on-a-Chip revolution that has already arrived and it’s going to change the way we know cell culture till now.
