Ventilator-on-a-chip compares injury caused by mechanical ventilation

In a new study, using a ventilator-on-a-chip model developed at The Ohio State University, researchers found that shear stress from the collapse and reopening of the air sacs is the most harmful type of damage.

This miniature organ-on-a-chip model simulates lung injury during mechanical ventilation plus repair and recovery in human-derived cells in real time, said co-lead author Samir Ghadiali, PhD, professor and chair of biomedical engineering at Ohio State.

“The initial damage is purely physical, but the processes after that are biological in nature – and what we’re doing with this device is coupling the two,” Ghadiali said in a statement.

The team hopes the device will also help in the development of therapies to address ventilator-induced lung injury.

“This is an important advance in the field that will hopefully allow for a better understanding of how lung injury develops in mechanically ventilated patients and identification of therapeutic targets so that we can give drugs to prevent that kind of injury or treat it when it happens,” said co-lead author Joshua Englert, MD, associate professor of pulmonary, critical care and sleep medicine at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.