E5304, GBA-CONNECT, Kungliga Tekniska Högskolan

Purpose and goal:

The interaction between the gut microbiota and the brain, the so-called gut-brain Axis (GBA), has been shown to have a role in mental health and possibly other neurological diseases. To facilitate investigating this interaction and testing potential drugs, we aim to develop an automated GBA on-chip platform, where human-based cells are cultivated, mimicking the brain connected to the gut. We from KTH will contribute with our expertise to developing on-chip brain models using human-derived cells

Expected results and effects:

We will develop a commercialized automated on-chip cell culture platform to study the GBA. The platform includes regulated media flow, temperature control, and integrated imaging, simplifying on-chip cell culture experiments and making them accessible for labs unable to fabricate their own platforms. KTHs will gain access to a top-notch automated cell cultivation system, which reduces the workload of labor-intensive on-chip experiments and accelerates high throughput investigations on the GBA.

Approach and implementation:

In the first step, the partners from Cellbox Labs will provide the chip culture devices, and we from KTH will optimize the cell culture experiments to cultivate brain cells on-chip, such as brain endothelial cells or astrocytes, and then co-culture them with gut cells to mimic the GBA. In the second step, Cellbox Lab will provide their automated cell cultivation system to test their setup with our cell culture models and implement possible optimization steps before commercializing the platform.