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Front Bioeng Biotechnol 2022 25;10:945149. Epub 2022 Jul 25.

National Research Council, CNR-IEIIT, Genoa, Italy.

The success of immunotherapeutic approaches strictly depends on the immune cells interaction with cancer cells. While conventional cell cultures under-represent the complexity and dynamic crosstalk of the tumor microenvironment, animal models do not allow deciphering the anti-tumor activity of the human immune system. Therefore, the development of reliable and predictive preclinical models has become crucial for the screening of immune-therapeutic approaches. Read More

Biosens Bioelectron 2022 Jul 20;215:114571. Epub 2022 Jul 20.

Department of Electronic Engineering, University of Rome Tor Vergata, 00133, Rome, Italy; Interdisciplinary Center for Advanced Studies on Lab-on-Chip and Organ-on-Chip Applications (ICLOC), Via del Politecnico 1, 00133, Rome, Italy. Electronic address:

Organ-on-chip and tumor-on-chip microfluidic cell cultures represent a fast-growing research field for modelling organ functions and diseases, for drug development, and for promising applications in personalized medicine. Still, one of the bottlenecks of this technology is the analysis of the huge amount of bio-images acquired in these dynamic 3D microenvironments, a task that we propose to achieve by exploiting the interdisciplinary contributions of computer science and electronic engineering. In this work, we apply this strategy to the study of oncolytic vaccinia virus (OVV), an emerging agent in cancer immunotherapy. Read More

Drug Deliv Transl Res 2022 Aug 5. Epub 2022 Aug 5.

School of Pharmacy, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland.

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a heterogeneous malignancy affecting myeloid cells in the bone marrow (BM) but can spread giving rise to impaired hematopoiesis. AML incidence increases with age and is associated with poor prognostic outcomes. There has been a disconnect between the success of novel drug compounds observed in preclinical studies of hematological malignancy and less than exceptional therapeutic responses in clinical trials. Read More

Methods Mol Biol 2022 ;2535:49-57

School of Biomedical Engineering, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia.

Breast cancer (BC) is a leading cause of cancer death among women worldwide. To better understand and predict therapeutic response in BC patient developing a fast, low-cost, and reliable preclinical tumor from patient's tumor specimen is needed. Here, we describe the development of a preclinical model of BC through the generation and ex vivo culture of patient-derived organotypic tumor spheroids (PDOTS) in a 3D microfluidic device. Read More

Acta Biomater 2022 Jul 14. Epub 2022 Jul 14.

Soft Matter Physics and Biophysics Unit, Department of Physics and Astronomy, KU Leuven, 3001 Leuven, Belgium; Biological Information Processing IB-4, Forschungszentrum Jülich, 52425 Jülich, Germany. Electronic address:

Disease research and drug screening platforms require in vitro model systems with cellular cues resembling those of natural tissues. Fibrillar alignment, occurring naturally in extracellular matrices, is one of the crucial attributes in tissue development. Obtaining fiber alignment in 3D, in vitro remains an important challenge due to non-linear material characteristics. Read More