Innervated 3D skin models for pain sensing

National Center For Advancing Translational Sciences

Investigators

Abstract

Development of bioprinted innervated 3D skin models for pain/itch sensing: Pain drugs are being developed using engineered cell lines and animal models which are not very predictive of activity in humans, thus leading to a high number of failures in clinic despite good preliminary genetic evidence. There is a critical need to develop in vitro pain models that are more predictive of drug activity in the clinic. These in vitro cellular models should include human sensory neurons in the context on the tissue where pain is produced and in a format that is amenable to screening to ensure these models make an impact as preclinical assays for drug development. • The NCATS 3DTBL team has now established a protocol for the biofabrication of innervated vascularized skin tissues in an HTS amenable 96-well multiwell platform, which responds to capsaicin (pain) and IL4 (itch) stimuli, as measured by electrophysiology. The 3DTBL is using iPSC nociceptors from the NCATS SCTL and the commercially sourced from Anatomics.