Tech: Human Body on a Chip Research

DARPA and NIH to fund ‘human body on a chip’ research:

MIT-led team to receive up to $32 million from DARPA and NIH to develop technology that could accelerate pace and efficiency of pharmaceutical testing

Researchers in the Department of Biological Engineering at MIT plan to develop a technology platform that will mimic human physiological systems in the laboratory, using an array of integrated, interchangeable engineered human tissue constructs, with $32 million funding over the next five years from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

A cooperative agreement between MIT and DARPA worth up to $26.3 million will be used to establish a new program titled “Barrier-Immune-Organ: MIcrophysiology, Microenvironment Engineered TIssue Construct Systems” (BIO-MIMETICS) at MIT, in collaboration with researchers at the Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, MatTek Corp. and Zyoxel Ltd.

Source: Kurzweilai