Artificial ‘brain in a dish’ is created that ages ‘just like a human brain’ and can shed light on conditions such as Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia
- Organoids are simplified miniature versions of real organs grown in the laboratory
- They are made of stem cells with the potential to form different cell types
- Brain organs have already helped experts learn about autism and epilepsy
- However, it was thought that they would not develop beyond the fetal stage
- This meant that organoids were unfit to study adult diseases such as dementia
- But experts have shown that they can mature and follow an internal clock like ours.
A ‘brain in a dish’ grown from stem cells in the laboratory can develop ‘just like a human brain’ – and can help illuminate conditions such as Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia.
Researchers from the USA conducted extensive genetic analyzes of the so-called ‘organoids’ that could grow up to 20 months in experimental dishes.
They found that the artificial brains apparently grow in phases according to an internal clock – one that corresponds to the development of real baby brains.
The findings suggest that organoids are capable of developing beyond a ‘fetal’ stage, in contrast to what was previously accepted.
As a result, brain organs may be aging to such an extent that they can be used by scientists to study adult diseases such as dementia.
A brain organoid (pictured) grown in the stem cell laboratory can develop ‘just like a human brain’ – and can help alleviate conditions such as Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia.
Researchers from the USA conducted extensive genetic analyzes of the so-called ‘organoids’ that could grow up to 20 months in experimental dishes.
“So far no one was able to send in the perfect solution, which is not strange,” said author and neurologist Daniel Geschwind of the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).
“It is also not shown that they will mostly summarize the development of the human brain in a laboratory environment.”
‘It will be an important boost for the field. “We have shown that these organoids can age many aspects of normal human development and it is a good model to study human diseases in a dish,” he said.
In their study, the team created their brain organoids using so-called induced pluripotent stem cells, which can give rise to many different cell types.
The stem cells themselves are derived from skin and blood cells that have been reprogrammed in an embryonic state.
When the stem cells are subjected to the right mix of chemicals, they grow into brain cells and organize themselves to produce three-dimensional structures that faithfully replicate certain aspects of the development of real human brains.
Researchers are interested in the growth of stemoids from stem cells because they may have the potential to respond to the ways in which we study how complex organs – such as the brain – develop as well as diseases.
In fact, scientists are already using human brain organs to study neurological and neurodevelopmental disorders, including autism, epilepsy and schizophrenia.
Until now, however, it has been assumed that the cells of the form of organoids are unable to develop further than a condition similar to that seen during the development of the fetus, which is the extent to which these models use can be, limited.
The findings of this new study suggest that it would be possible to grow the organoid cells to such maturity that researchers could also study diseases that occur during adulthood, such as dementia and schizophrenia.
“There is great interest in stem cell models of human disease,” says Dr Geschwind.
“Until now, no one has been growing these organoids for this time,” said Daniel Geschwind, author and neurologist at UCLA. ‘It is also not shown that they will mostly summarize the development of the human brain in a laboratory environment’ ‘An organoid
“This work is an important milestone in indicating which aspects of human brain development are based on the highest fidelity and which specific genes perform well in vitro and when it is best to model them.”
“Equally important, we provide a framework based on unbiased genomic analyzes to determine how well in vitro models model in vivo development and function.”
“We show that these 3D brain organs follow an internal clock that progresses in a laboratory environment, in parallel with what occurs within a living organism,” said author and biologist Aaron Gordon, also of UCLA.
“This is a remarkable finding – we show that they reach postnatal adulthood in culture for about 280 days, and then begin to model aspects of the baby’s brain, including known physiological changes in the neurotransmitter signal.”
The full findings of the study were published in the journal Nature Neuroscience.