home > bioprinting > mission.html.en Share page:

The 3D Bioprinting Lab

at Medical University of Innsbruck

Mission

In every multicellular organism, cells are in permanent contact to each other and the extracellular matrix, which steers their differentiation and function. In conventional cell culture, cells are grown in one layer on plastic plates – a rather non-physiologic situation, which significantly changes the behavior and response of cultured cells and exerts selective pressure on them. Therefore, results obtained from such cell culture experiments have limited relevance for the in vivo function in tissues and organs. 

Our mission is to mimic the architecture of normal and malignant tissue by assembling extracellular matrix proteins and cells in 3D using high-end 3D bioprinters. The 3D-printed, cell-seeded scaffolds are then maturated in custom-designed perfusion systems to develop living tissue-surrogates for testing drugs and novel therapies.  In specific, we are developing test models for patient-specific drug-testing to support clinicians in treatment decisions and strategies for tissue replacement and tissue regeneration.