Biomedical turning point gets all of 2 minutes on CBS show

Lung-on-a-chip promises a revolution in biomedical methods

The crew at CBS’ This Morning seemed oblivious to the importance of this major breakthrough.  (Problem is, that’s hardly unusual for an industry populated by mediocrities and nincompoops.)

Patrice Greanville

The news—if properly understood—is huge. Humanity may have crossed a major threshold in the field of  medical research technology, an advance that could not only signify an enormous step forward for research itself, but liberation from horrendous experiments for untold millions of animals.

The significance of such a development apparently eluded the crew on the CBS This Morning show. Consequently there was no hint of celebration. But that’s no surprise.  We know that these people—from the producers to the on-camera “talent” (i.e., people like the clueless Norah O’Donnell) are not exactly really well educated, nor are they people with even slightly above average sensibilities.

Fierce ambition, an unenviable antenna for conformity, the conventional wisdom, wherever that may be, no matter how repulsive or backward, plus lucky accidents like good genetics or connections explain their presence on the tube. (Who can deny that most of the women on tv and quite a few of the men got there on the basis of their good looks, and family or personal connections? How do we explain a stunningly mediocre lightweight like Jenna Bush? A Gayle King? (Hint: Oprah is her close buddy.)

Well, in any case it’s almost a miracle of sorts that CBS did cover this colossal news. Because one of the main objections to animal models in medical research, besides their cost and management issues, not to mention the huge ethical problems presented by doing horrendous experiments on involuntary subjects, is the fact that findings via tests on lab animals have at times proven lethally misleading. On the public mind the Thalidomide scandal may be the best known such misfire, but it is one of many in the long history of biomedical research. With the new approach, which utilizes human cells from the start, the projected outcomes could in time show a much higher level of dependability. And that’s a vast improvement for all parties concerned.

Again, judging by the stingy time the producers allotted to this story (just a bit over 2 minutes) it’s clear they totally failed to realize its implications. It sends chills down my spine to think that they might have casually tossed it aside for the latest bit of celebrity or political gossip. Typical of our “professional media.”

POSTSCRIPT

For those who wonder how this epochal invention came into being, the WIKI provides some valuable info:

Lung on a Chip is a complex, three-dimensional model of a living, breathing human lung on a microchip. The device is made using human lung and blood vessel cells and it can predict absorption of airborne nanoparticles and mimic the inflammatory response triggered by microbial pathogens. It can be used to test the effects of environmental toxins, absorption of aerosolized therapeutics, and the safety and efficacy of new drugs. It is expected to become an alternative to animal testing.

The lung-on-a-chip places two layers of living tissues—the lining of the lung’s air sacs and the blood vessels that surround them—across a porous, flexible boundary. Air is delivered to the lung lining cells, a rich culture medium flows in the capillary channel to mimic blood, and cyclic mechanical stretching is generated by a vacuum applied to the chambers adjacent to the cell culture channels to mimic breathing.

The research findings for lung-on-a-chip were published in the June 25, 2010, issue of Science,^[1] the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health, the American Heart Association, and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University.

The power and versatility of this model has already been demonstrated.

The response of the lung-on-a-chip to inhaled living pathogens was tested by introducing E. Coli bacteria into the air channel on the lung air sac side of the device, while flowing white blood cells through the channel on the blood vessel side. The lung cells detected the bacteria and, through the porous membrane, activated the blood vessel cells, which in turn triggered an immune response that ultimately caused the white blood cells to move to the air chamber and destroy the bacteria.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Media critic Patrice Greanville is the founding editor of The Greanville Post.  He also publishes Cyrano’s Journal Today, helmed by colleague Rowan Wolf.

ADDENDUM
Expanded transcript of CBS segment

(CBS News) Cutting-edge “lung on a chip” technology is poised to revolutionize the way scientists test new drugs. The first-of-its kind device may be a faster, cheaper way to develop drugs and avoid the need to perform testing on animals.

The technology, as Dr. Donald Ingber, lead researcher and director of the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard, showed on “CBS This Morning,” is a clear polymer chip that mimics the organ’s function, as it is lined with living human cells inside hollow channels. He explained, “The cells come from the air sack of the lung and the blood capillaries of the lung. And just like it does in our lung, it actually can mimic whole organ functions.”

How?

Ingber said, “We actually have hollow channels that mimic the air sack of our lung; we have cells from a human air sack on top of a membrane with air on the opposite side of the membrane, just like in our lungs; we have capillary blood vessels with medium mimicking blood and flowing by. We can put white blood cells in, and then we can make it breathe. It actually stretches and relaxes. Doing all that, it actually mimics whole organ function.”

The chip can mimic disease processes, such as fluid on the lungs and pulmonary edema. Ingber added, “We can put bacteria back in and actually mimic infections, and we can actually test drugs for both efficacy and toxicities, so essentially, over time to replace animal testing.”

Other organ chips are in the works as well, according to Ingber. He said on “CTM,” “We’ve got funding from the Department of Defense, FDA, NIH to develop over 10 different organs: kidney, heart, lung, gut, etc., and to link them together because they’re little hollow channels that have flowing medium to mimic blood that we can connect them all by the same blood vessels like in our body, and so the idea is you can actually put an oral drug through the gut and watch it be broken down by the liver, peed out by the kidney, and ask, ‘Does it have heart toxicity?’ and also prevent fluid on the lungs.”

For more with Ingber on the “lung on a chip,” watch the video above.