Los Angeles-based Cedars-Sinai Medical Center partnered with Boston-based organs-on-chip provider Emulate to establish a precision medicine program, the organizations confirmed Feb. 20.
The partnership applies stem cell science from the Cedars-Sinai Board of Governors Regenerative Medicine Institute with Emulate's Human Emulation System, which uses liver, intestine and brain organ-chips to recreate a microcosm of human biology under various disease states.
Together, the organizations have launched a "Patient-on-a-Chip" program that integrates stem cells — which can be reprogrammed into any organ cell — from an individual patient into organ-chips, which are then personalized to that patient's biology.
The participating researchers hypothesize the personalized Patient-on-a-Chip technology will help clinicians predict which treatments are most effective for an individual patient based on their genetic makeup and disease variant.
The researchers suggested clinicians could gain accurate insights into a patient's treatment response by placing his or her cells in organ-chips and exposing these cells to a particular drug. They also suggested the technology could be used to predict how a disease progresses in an individual patient.
"By creating a personalized Patient-on-a-Chip, we can really begin to understand how diseases, medicines, chemicals and foods affect an individual's health," said Geraldine A. Hamilton, PhD, president and chief scientific officer of Emulate.