Researchers from Australia and China have developed an "artery on a chip" that replicates a patient's specific blood vessel structure and blood flow dynamics to help predict stroke risk.
Published in the journal Cell Biomaterials , the study describes the device as a "physical twin," and suggests that blood vessel shape and local blood flow disturbances may be more important determinants of stroke risk than narrowing of the blood vessels alone, according to a summary of the study published on the Australian Science Media Centre.
"We hope this device will allow us to study drugs aimed at reducing stroke risk and ultimately provide personalized treatment for each patient based on their anatomy," said the study's first author, Zhao Yunduo, from the University of Sydney, Australia.
To test the platform, the researchers reconstructed carotid arteries from six patients with varying degrees of disease and used computational fluid dynamics to model blood flow, which revealed striking differences in local blood flow despite similar degrees of arterial narrowing.
After using a laser to create tiny wounds in the underlying collagen, they also observed that blood clotting occurred differently depending on the shape of the artery. The team is currently recruiting stroke patients for a clinical trial.
