Scientists 3D printed the heart with six kinds of "inks"

The John Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) of Harvard University in the United States issued a press release on the 24th, stating that a research team of the school has developed a new 3D printing technology that can print organ chips with integrated sensing functions
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The heart chip they printed for the first time can be quickly assembled and customized, making data collection easier and opening up a new way for drug research
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Related research is published in "Nature·Materials" magazine
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Organ chip is considered to be a revolutionary technology in life science research and has broad application prospects in the fields of medicine, scientific research and clinical drug design
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However, the manufacture of organ chips and data collection is not an easy task.
Not only does it have extremely high requirements for the manufacturing environment, but the manufacturing process is also very complicated, costly, and time-consuming
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This time, the SEAS research team used advanced digital manufacturing technology to develop a new organ chip manufacturing method
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They integrated the flexible strain sensor with the human tissue micro-architecture, and developed six different "inks", and then used 3D printing technology to print the heart chip through a single, continuous manufacturing process
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There are many "small wells" on this chip, and each "small well" has independent organizations and integrated sensors
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Using this chip, a variety of heart tissues can be studied
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　　For a long time, researchers have not been able to obtain simple non-invasive methods to study the function of heart tissue.
It is difficult for them to observe the slow changes in the development of heart tissue for a long time, and conduct corresponding data collection and research
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The heart chip provides a new research method, and integrated sensors can continuously collect data during tissue growth
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To demonstrate the effectiveness of the chip, the research team conducted drug research and studies on the contraction and expansion of heart tissue that lasted for several weeks, and the results showed that the heart chip performed well
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　　The researchers said that the new method to integrate multiple functional materials on one device is a huge advancement in 3D printing technology.

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The new programmable organ chip manufacturing method not only allows researchers to easily design and customize organ chips that match specific diseases or even individual patient cells, but also greatly simplifies the difficulty of data collection, which is suitable for in vitro tissue engineering, toxicology and medicine.
Screening research opens up new avenues
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