One of the first focuses of organ-chip specialist Emulate (Boston) was to reduce the need for animal testing over time. Its technology can simulate tissue-tissue interfaces within organs using human cells. But the potential of the organ chips to yield mechanistic insights for drug discovery and understanding toxicities has become more evident over time.  The…

Emulate has debuted what it terms a “colon intestine chip” targeted at pharma and biotech companies, academics and other researchers. The company believes the system will accelerate the identification of drug candidates to treat inflammatory damage in the colon. The technology could be a boon for understanding inflammatory bowel disease, which approximately 1.6 million people in…

While organ-on-a-chip technology has evolved tremendously over the past 15 years, adoption of the technology remains at an early stage. But as organ-chip technology advances and the R&D costs for pharma companies continue to hover near unsustainable levels, organ-on-a-chip technology has the promise to address what cell biologist and bioengineer Donald Ingber called the “broken”…