Overview

The Cellular Microsystems and Biosensors Laboratory at Mayo Clinic has a long-standing interest in using biomaterials and microfluidic devices to culture cells for disease modeling or regenerative medicine applications. Our team also develops biosensors that are integrated with cell culture systems or used as stand-alone diagnostic devices.

The lab has established expertise in long-term liver cell and explant cultures for disease modeling. More recently, we have been expanding the use of microfluidic devices to culture gut, pancreatic and cancer cells.

Important emerging interests in the lab are intact tissue or explant cultures. We believe that microfluidic explant cultures are particularly exciting for personalizing therapy selection when treating cancer or chronic inflammatory diseases where a biopsy may be used to identify the best therapies for a patient.

In parallel with establishing novel cell culture systems for disease modeling and personalized medicine, the lab has an interest in biosensors for point-of-care or clinical testing. Our team focuses on various applications of biosensors. We are particularly interested in extracellular vesicles since these lipid nanoparticles carry markers identifying tissue of origin and disease state of that tissue. Because tissue samples from patients are often too sparse for sensor development and biomarker validation, we are using organ-on-chip disease models to collect material for these purposes. This is one way that organ-on-chip and biosensors research intersect in the lab.