Harvard University scientists can now use an organ on a chip to recreate human gut microbiomes and diagnose disease-causing imbalances, a new study finds.
In the last decade, we've learned that the gut and the bacteria populations that live in it have far more influence on our overall health than previously thought.
But studying how these bacteria behave within the gut has been next to impossible - until now.
The team that developed an 'organ-on-a-chip' has now developed a chip intestine that can sustain the complex microbes that would exist in a human gut, as well as a microchip version of the human intestine.
Their latest achievement, they hope, will pave the way to being able to work out what a 'healthy' gut microbiome looks like so scientists can test, treat and prevent diseases that are linked to these microorganisms .
A microprocessing chip (pictured) can mimics the lining of the intestines and the gut microbes within it to help doctors diagnose diseases and how well drugs will work for each individual
Researchers now believe that many diseases and conditions, including inflammatory bowel disease, cancer, metabolic, autoimmune disease and even psychiatric disorders are influenced if not caused by certain gut flora.
But like many other organs, figuring out exactly what causes these disease and how is a complex matter and is especially hard to test and prove.
Blood tests are imperfect ways to look at what is going on in an individual's gut, and trying to interpret lab results can mean guess work for doctors and frustrating trial-and-error treatments for patients.
In vitro - or petri dish - studies make it easier and less invasive for scientists to study what exactly might underlie patient's symptoms.
Yet a petri dish doesn't exactly mimic the body's mechanisms.
To solve that problem, a number of
