Abstract

Spleen-on-a-Chip: From Nanotoxicology to Infection Disease Application

Josep Samitier, Director, Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia

Through a complex organizational architecture, the spleen is perfectly adapted to selectively filter and eliminate senescent Red Blood Cells as well as blood-borne infectious organisms. Such complex architecture includes the splenic white pulp, red pulp, and the marginal zone. The filtering capacity of the spleen is inherently linked to the complex vasculature of the organ, controlling events such as blood passage through the reticular meshwork of the red pulp; entry into the marginal sinuses or the marginal zone; drainage through perimarginal cavernous sinuses or capillary branches; or entry into the white pulp. With the aim of studying RBCs filtration in the spleen, here it is presented a multilayered microengineered device of the human splenon-on-a-chip. With this device, engineered to mimic the splenic closed-fast and open-slow microcirculations, the reticular meshwork and the Interendothelial slits filtering capacity, hopefully it would be possible to advance in the knowledge of the spleen’s function in malaria and other haematological disorders. Moreover, another goal is to demonstrate the practicality of the platform for both structure-function studies. Some 3D culture models fail to reconstitute features of living organs that are crucial for their function, such as blood–tissue interfaces. In this regard, the proposed system takes advantage of co-flow phenomena, in order to properly coat and culture the different sections of the device, when needed, with splenic human cells. To complete the system, it is introduced an autonomous closed-loop pumping machinery, connected to the splenon-on-a-chip to simulate human blood flowing with physiological conditions.