Plugging Organoids into the Brain

Providing lab-grown ‘cerebral organoids’ with connections similar to those in real brains enhances their development and activity
“To understand the mechanistic significance of inter-regional projections on development of neural circuits, we [University of Tokyo] investigated an in vitro neural tissue model for inter-regional connections, in which two cerebral organoids are connected with a bundle of reciprocally extended axons. The connected organoids produced more complex and intense oscillatory activity than conventional or directly fused cerebral organoids, suggesting the inter-organoid axonal connections enhance and support the complex network activity. In addition, optogenetic stimulation of the inter-organoid axon bundles could entrain the activity of the organoids and induce robust short-term plasticity of the macroscopic circuit. These results demonstrated that the projection axons could serve as a structural hub that boosts functionality of the organoid-circuits. MORE
Image Credit: University of Tokyo