Microfluidic vessels-on-chips for vascular disease modelling

More than 30% of all deaths worldwide have a vascular cause, which mostly involves heart attack or stroke caused by arterial diseases such as atherosclerosis. The exact mechanisms of for example early development of atherosclerosis are still unknown and need to be investigated in order to find new strategies for prevention and treatment. Organs-on-chips (OoCs) and specifically blood vessels-on-chips (BVoCs) can assist in investigating vascular diseases, by recapitulating the human vasculature more accurately than other models such as animal models. In this thesis we have developed and presented multiple vessel-on-chip models to investigate different types of vascular disease. These models vary from 3D BVoCs for early atherosclerosis modelling to blood-brain-barrier modellig.
As vascular diseases are still the main cause of death worldwide, modelling the vasculature is very important in understanding vascular mechanisms and diseases. BVoCs can help interconnect multiple different OoCs. Multiple BVoC models are already in existence and can be used to model different types of vasculature in disease and health. The models presented in this thesis are an addition to the models already in existence and can greatly benefit our understanding of vascular mechanisms. By using BVoCs, we can move towards a more complex, more personalized model and greatly improve patient-specific treatments and mechanistic disease understanding.