Gut on a chip

Caco-2 cell line is the most employed human intestinal epithelial cell line for the study of the intestinal barrier. The intestine on a chip is an existing model, but it is not widely used, since it takes a long time for the differentiation of the Caco-2 cells. We are looking into the gene expression profile in the differentiated Caco-2 cells, in order to target the most important genes that are implied in the differentiation process. Those genes would be up-regulated, in a way that they would be expressed faster than regular by the epithelial cell. The ultimate goal would be to design a gut-on-a-chip device, in which the differentiation would happen faster than normally, because of the presence of genetically modified Caco-2 cells in the imitated intestinal epithelium.