Hepatitis B Infects Organ-on-a-Chip Platform

For the first time, a real pathogen has instigated a real disease process in an artificial organ, and scientists are really, really pleased. As far as scientists are concerned, the whole point of an artificial organ—in this case, a liver-on-a-chip platform—is to simulate a real organ’s physiology, and that includes pathophysiology. By using an artificial liver to model the interactions between human tissue and an infectious agent—in this case, hepatitis B—scientists