FET OPEN on Integrated Tissue Slice Culture and NMR Metabolomics for Verpoorte

Groningen researcher Sabeth Verpoorte (Groningen Research Institute of Pharmacy), Marcel Utz (University of Southampton), and Jan Korvink (Karlsruher Institute für Technologie) have been awarded the FET Open project ‘Integrated Tissue Slice Culture and NMR Metabolomics – A Novel Approach Towards Systemic Understanding of Liver Function And Disease’. The project was granted EUR 3.2 M€ by H2020, of which approx. 950 k€ will go to the Verpoorte group. It was one of only 22 projects awarded out of 544 submitted proposals in this FET Open round.

Verpoorte and colleagues will develop an innovative technology platform that integrates nuclear magnetic resonance metabolomics and micro-imaging with microfluidic tissue-slice perfusion culture. This platform is poised to revolutionise life science research by providing unprecedented local insight into life processes in intact tissues under highly controlled conditions. The team will focus on liver tissue-slice culture, with the immediate target of elucidating the mechanism of liver damage by drug-induced cholestasis. In the long term, the new technology will find wide application in other tissues, including intestinal, pancreatic, and brain slices. It will form the foundation of a new approach in the life sciences, allowing the detailed metabolic study of tissues at the system level.