A research team around Dr. Andreas Weltin, Dr. Jochen Kieninger and Johannes Dornhof from the Department of Microsystems Engineering (IMTEK) at the University of Freiburg has developed a system that, among other things, makes it possible to study the development of tumor cells outside the human body in a three-dimensional environment. “We have realized an organ-on-chip system that can measure and control the culture conditions and metabolic rates of the cells at any time via microsensors. Until now, this has been only insufficiently possible in 3D cell cultures,” Weltin says. The system was developed in collaboration with the Molecular Gynecology group of the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at RWTH Aachen University Hospital. In the future, patient-derived cells in organ-on-chip systems could enable personalized cancer therapy. The scientists’ work was published in the scientific journal Lab on a Chip.