Integrated platform for functional monitoring of 3D engineered brain-tissue for fundamental research and drug screening – 3DNeuroChip

Integrated platform for functional monitoring of 3D engineered brain-tissue for fundamental research and drug screening.


Neural disorders are affecting more than 10% of the world population (WHO 2016). Identifying therapeutic solutions to these diseases has become the prime societal interest. However, seldom functional data are available in human to help us in this task due to the technicity required to acquire these data. Additionally, most functional studies have been carried out with mixed success in animal models. Moreover, they have several limitations: the ethical issues associated with animal experiment, their high cost, and the growing realization of their limited ability to replicate the progression of human diseases.
Based on these facts, we now need in vitro model systems capable of replicating key features of tissues to advances our understanding of human pathologies. Such systems would be instrumental to set related studies up to an unprecedented dimension and could lead to better and faster development of pharmaceutical strategies to fight against neural disorders. With this aim in mind, the goal of this project is to integrate the expertise of the three partners to implement non-invasive in vitro and in silico technologies to monitor and model neuronal activity at a microscopic level in human-derived micro-tissues.