A New Model of Lung Disease Paves the Way for Personalized Treatments

Scientists engineered a lung-on-a-chip model from patient cells that mimics cystic fibrosis.

Written byNele Haelterman, PhD
| 4 min read
Don Ingber engineered cystic fibrosis airway chips that recapitulate patient symptoms.
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Cystic fibrosis (CF) is a devastating hereditary disease that causes persistent lung infections, which limit a patient’s ability to breathe over time. While recent therapeutic breakthroughs improve patient life expectancy, many ultimately succumb to CF because available therapies fail to protect against respiratory infections. Researchers have struggled to develop better treatments because few preclinical models replicate key CF features and enable rigorous drug testing, but hope is on the horizon.1

In a recent study published in the Journal of Cystic Fibrosis, Don Ingber and his group at the Wyss Institute of Biologically Inspired Engineering presented the CF airway chip—a new in vitro model engineered with patient cells.2 This chip, which mimics the pathological hallmarks of the disease, will allow scientists to better understand CF pathogenesis and screen for more effective drugs to treat the disorder in patients with diverse genetic backgrounds and comorbidities.

Ingber has spent a large part of ...

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Meet the Author

  • Nele Haelterman, PhD Headshot

    Nele earned her PhD in developmental biology from Baylor College of Medicine. During her graduate and postgraduate training, she developed gene editing technologies for characterizing human disease genes in flies and mice. Nele loves combining science communication and advocacy. She runs a blog for early career scientists and promotes open, reproducible science. In July 2021, Nele joined The Scientist’s Creative Services Team as an assistant science editor.

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