Novel Microfluidic Perfusion Bioreactor for Vascularized Organ-on-a-Chip

By combining advanced microfluidic techniques, the perfusion-based bioreactor plays a critical role in 3D cell/tissue culture, especially for the construction of organ-on-a-chip models. This paper reports a novel microfluidic perfusion bioreactor design by separating microfluidic channels and tissue culture chambers into two separate layers, which can be applied to different applications by designing arbitrary structure with versatile flow profiles. As a proof of concept we have created a novel bioreactor design with more uniform line-to-line flow profiles and higher interstitial flow velocity compared to the conventional communication pore design with point-to-point flow profiles on the same layer. In addition, the microfluidic channel design perpendicular to the gel loading direction was implemented to realize either independent or interconnected horizontal flow pattern rather than the vertical one appeared in most conventional designs. The effectiveness of this novel bioreactor design is validated by using an in vitro vascularized organ-on-a-chip model.