A gift to oncologists: breast-on-a-chip

Artificial breasts will be treated for cancer
CNews R&D based on Purdue University materials:
Purdue team creates 'engineered organ' model for breast cancer research

Purdue University researchers have recreated a fragment of a breast in the form of a tiny model the size of a cover glass for an optical microscope. This model, dubbed "breast on a chip", will be used to test methods for detecting and treating breast cancer.

Breast cancer is the most common type of cancer in women. In the USA alone, about 40 thousand women have died from this disease over the past year. According to the head of the work Sophie Lelievre, most of the breast tumors originate in the depth of the milk ducts, so experts believe that the most effective approach to the diagnosis and treatment of this disease would be penetration into the ducts to study or directly affect the cells localized there.

The first attempts to wash out cells for oncological analysis by introducing special solutions into the outlets of the milk ducts on the nipple were unsuccessful. Due to the fluid pressure in the ducts, which gradually narrowed as they approached the milk-producing glands, the injected solutions did not penetrate deeper than one third of the breast.

Scientists hope to solve this problem by using magnetic nanoparticles that, under the influence of a magnetic field, will move around the entire volume of the breast and attach to malignant cells. Excess nanoparticles will be removed by turning off the magnetic field. Depending on the purpose of the procedure, nanoparticles can be loaded with contrast agents for diagnosis, fluorescent markers to facilitate the work of surgeons, or antitumor drugs to destroy the tumor.

Testing of this approach is not possible using standard models representing flat cell cultures, so the researchers developed a three-dimensional replica of the breast. This model, made using the nanolithography method, is a matrix of a rubber-like polydimethylsiloxane material permeated with branching tubules about 5 mm long and 20-100 microns thick. After colonization with cells lining the inner surface of the milk ducts, this model turns into an almost exact copy of a fragment of the duct system.

(The drawings show a biochip lying on a slide and a virtual longitudinal section of one of the tubules.)

Scientists have demonstrated the possibility of moving magnetic nanoparticles through the duct system of the model they created, which has not yet been populated by cells. In the near future, they plan to develop nanoparticles that will selectively bind to malignant cells, and test them with the final version of the "breast on a chip". They emphasize that their work is still very far from completion, but they hope that in the future it will save many lives.

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27.01.2011