ZOMBIE brains could soon become a powerful tool for drug developers. A biotech company has developed a way to keep slices of living brain tissue alive for weeks, allowing researchers to study the effect of chemicals on entire neural networks, not just individual cells.
“We are building stripped-down mini-brains, if you will, directly on a chip,” says Miro Pastrnak, business development director of Tensor Biosciences of Irvine, California. He says the “brain-on-a-chip” could help drugs developers find better treatments for a host of neurological and psychiatric disorders, from Alzheimer’s disease to schizophrenia. Tensor may already have found a more effective treatment for anxiety this way.…
