How have scientists used "mini" organizations in recent years to help improve human health research?

In recent years, as scientists have developed a variety of "mini" organizations to help their research progress and improve human health, in this article, the editor-in-chief on the relevant important research results to organize and share with you! Photo Credit: NIAID1 Nature: Studying how SARS-CoV-2 can damage the human body and cause death with mini-organs! Doi:10.1038/d41586-020-01864-xSARS-CoV-2 This virus can damage lung, liver and kidney tissue grown in the laboratory, which may explain some serious complications of COVID-19 in humans.
researchers are developing tiny organs in the lab to study how the new coronavirus can damage the human body.
of these organs revealed the diversity of viruses in invading organs, from the lungs to the liver, kidneys and intestines.
also conducted drug trials in these micro-tissues to determine whether these therapies could be used to treat humans.
doctors learned from inpatients and autopsies that SARS-CoV-2 can have devastating effects on organs.
it is not clear whether the damage was caused directly by the virus or by secondary complications of infection.
team is using organ-like studies to show where the virus spreads in the body, which cells it infects and which ones it damages.
the beauty of organoids is that they resemble the real form of tissue," said Thomas Efferth, a cell biologist at the University of Johannes Gutenberg in Mainz, Germany.
" virologists often use cell line or animal cells cultured in petri dishes to study viruses.
but the researchers say they don't simulate SARS-CoV-2 infections very well because they don't simulate what's going on in the body.
Montserrat, a stem cell biologist at the Catalan Institute of Bioengineering in Barcelona, Spain, said organisms are better evidence of the effects of SARS-CoV-2 on human tissue.
can grow into cells that include multiple cell types and form the shape of the original organ within a few weeks, said Monserrat, a leading donor.
they are also cheaper than animal models and avoid the ethical issues they bring.
(2) Scientists have developed mini lung tissue for SARS-CoV-2 research News Reading: Researchers Cultivate mini lungs for SARS-CoV-2 Research Recently, scientists from Bochum Ruhr University and others wanted to study the infection process of SARS-CoV-2 and identify potential antiviral substances by using stem cell-derived organs. In the most natural conditions, the researchers were able to study the details of new coronavirus infections using stem cell-differentiated human lung organs, a method that could help them detect a variety of active substances during high-flung screening, known as "analysis of SARS-Cov-2 infections of human lung organs" by researcher Torsten Muller et al.
Similar to embryos, organoids are derived from induced erythrocytes, and compared to animal models previously used by researchers and cell cultures based on human lung tissue, organoids have several advantages, namely that they come from human cells, can be mass produced, and have the same genetic background, so there are no possible differences between them from different donors.
The organ-like system can form a reliable 3-D model that helps researchers study the complex interactions between different cell types in lung tissue, and the researchers aim to optimize the model into a high-flung method with a lower variability rate to study SARS-Cov-2 infections, said Muller, who said the team is now interested in studying virus replication, the occurrence of COVID-19, inflammatory mechanisms, and the release of immune messengers in lung tissue.
the lab-grown "mini" brain really be smarter than the human brain? News Read: Lab-grown mini brains: The technique of assembling cell clusters into miniature versions of the human brain in the lab is attracting more and more scientists' attention, and these stem cell-converted brain organs provide unparalleled insight into the human brain, which is notoriously difficult to study.
But some researchers worry that these mini-brains may produce some form of consciousness, sometimes even transplanted into animal bodies, at least to sense the extent of pain and trapping, and if that's right, we have to think very carefully about it before we consider making it possible.
Compared to the human brain, brain-like organs are relatively simple and cannot produce consciousness in the same way, and due to a lack of blood supply, these brain-like organs are no larger than 5 mm or 6 mm in size, i.e., they can produce brain waves similar to those of premature children, and studies have shown that they can grow neural networks that respond to light.
There are also indications that organs such as these can be connected to other organs and subjects in animals, meaning that brain organs not only have the potential to become perceptive organs, but also to communicate with the outside world through the collection of sensory information, perhaps one day producing certain reactions through sound devices or digital output.
Creating mini-brains in animals or in artificial biological environments may scare us, but the researchers believe that the moral impact may go far beyond the pain of those who create mini-brains, and that if researchers create a brain that, no matter how small, has the ability to process information, it may have the ability to think independently if there is enough time and input.
: The first genetically modified mini liver tissue to be grown in the laboratory promises to help research liver disease and develop new therapiesdoi:10.1016/j.) Cmet.2019.06.017 In a recent study published in the international journal Cell Metabolism, scientists from the University of Pittsburgh have developed the first genetically modified (genetically modified, genetically modified) micro-human liver in the laboratory, which may help simulate the progression of human liver disease and the development of new therapies. In the
article, the researchers explain how they transform genetically engineered human cells into functional 3D liver tissue that simulates alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease), a fat-accumulation liver disease that often causes cirrhosis and even liver failure.
'In this study, for the first time, we used stem cells in the lab to create genetically engineered human simulated liver tissue (disease status), which is important because it not only helps us understand the mechanisms that trigger the progression of liver disease and liver disease, but also helps to develop new treatments,' said aljandro Soto-Gutierrez, M.D. Although the drug has little effect in mice, it is often ineffective or failed in clinical trials; for example, the drug resveratrol, which works effectively in mouse models, has no effect in human clinical trials, and resveratrol works on SIRT1 proteins associated with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.
: Cell Stem Cell: Mini organs help study the function of liver cancer genes doi:10.1016/j.stem.2019.04.017 Researchers from the Hubrecht Institute and Radboud University have developed a mannequin that uses organs or small organs to study the function of specific genes that mutate in liver cancer.
using this method, they found that mutations in BAP1, a gene that usually mutates in liver cancer, alter the behavior of cells, which may make them more susceptible to invasion.
their findings were published in the journal Cell Stem Cell.
are tiny organs that can grow in the laboratory and come from very small tissues of various organs.
have been used in cancer research for several years, mainly by comparing organs from healthy organs with those from tumors.
, however, is not suitable for studying the function and function of specific genes known to mutate in cancer.
a new model is needed to learn more about tumor formation.
image: Princess Maxima Centre in Nature Biotechnology 6 BMC Devel Biol: Scientists hope to develop more complex mini-brain organs doi:10.1186/s12861-01 9-0183-y In a recent study published in the international journal BMC Developmental Biology, scientists from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro and other institutions studied a series of steps to create organs that show the structure of brain regions, including retinal pigment cells.
Human brain organs are amassed from nerve cells obtained from cell reprogramming, and in this study, researchers converted cells extracted from the skin or urine of volunteers into stem cells, neurons, and other types of nerve cells that were cultured for weeks until they began to form aggregates similar to those found in the embryo's brain.
Over the years, scientists have tried perfect models to develop more complex and late-stage-like organs, and in 2016 they studied the effects of neurological diseases and new drugs on the body's nervous system.
researchers placed nerve cells in a nutrient-rich liquid (similar to the developmental environment in a human embryo), and then these mini-brain tissues began to develop in a self-regulating process, in other words, they had to make sure they had a more appropriate environment to develop.
(7) Nat Biotechnol: Scientists have successfully used urine cells to develop mini kidney tissue doi:10.1038/s41587-019-0048-8.
With the rapid development of stem cell research in recent years, researchers have been able to grow mini-intestinal tissue, liver, lungs and pancreatic tissue in the lab, and recently were able to create mini-kidney tissue from so-called pleuripotent stem cells, in a study that used adult stem cells from the patient's body for the first time to find new treatments for kidney disease. The mini-kidney tissue produced by
Labs doesn't look like normal kidney tissue, but this simple cellular structure has many characteristics in common with real kidney tissue, so in this study, researchers used these simple cells to study specific kidney diseases, and researcher Professor Hans Clevers said, we can use simulated kidney tissue to simulate a variety of diseases, such as genetic kidney disease, infection and cancer, which can help us delve into the mechanisms of multiple diseases and develop new treatments for diseases such as kidney disease.
: Scientists develop new 'mini placenta' promising to uncover the mysteries of early pregnancy doi:10.1038/s41586-018-0753-3doi:10.1038/s41586-018-0698-6<!-- in two recent studies published in the international journal Nature, > scientists from the University of Cambridge and others have developed a new type of mini-placental tissue ><!--, a cell model of the early placenta, that may help researchers delve deeper into early pregnancy events and understand the mechanisms of reproductive disorders in the human body. <br/> Many pregnancy failures occur because the embryo is not properly implanted into the inner wall of the uterus and does not form the right placental tissue inside the mother's uterus, but because of the high complexity of studying the early development of the body, researchers are not currently aware of many events in the early development of the embryo, and animal models are not similar to humans, so it does not help scientists to study the mechanisms of placental development and implantation.
researcher Professor Margherita Turco said the placenta was important to support the growth of fetuses in the mother's body, and when it functioned abnormally, it could lead to serious problems, such as pre-eclampsia and miscarriage, and the lack of good experimental models has limited data for researchers in this area.
: Breakthrough! Scientists solve neuroscience research puzzles! Success in making the mini brain grow out of vascular doi:10.1097/WNR.0000