AEROSOL DRUG DELIVERY FOR LUNG ON A CHIP

Animal models for drug toxicity and efficacy are expensive and often do not accurately reflect the human response, resulting in wasteful clinical trials and ineffective drug development. Expanding human cell culture systems to microenvironments that mimic in vivo organ-level function may increase human relevance and translation of products to patients. Here we present a method of delivering aerosolized drug to a previously described biomimetic microfluidic device or ‘Lung-on-a-Chip” that reproduces the alveolar-capillary interface of the human lung under physiologically relevant cyclic mechanical strain and flow conditions (Huh et al., Science 2010; 328:1662-1668). We demonstrate the first reported deposition of aerosol into a microfluidic channel using a commercial nebulizer as a source of aerosol. This method should enable toxicity and efficacy testing of pulmonary drugs in a human-relevant in vitro system.