Organovo is an early-stage medical laboratory and research company which designs and develops functional, three dimensional human tissue (also known as

3D bioprinting Three dimensional (3D) bioprinting is the utilization of 3D printing–like techniques to combine cells, growth factors, and/or biomaterials to fabricate biomedical parts, often with the aim of imitating natural tissue characteristics. Generally, 3 ...

technology) for medical research and therapeutic applications. Organovo was established in 2007 and is headquartered in

San Diego, California San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United Stat ...

. The company uses its internally developed

NovoGen NovoGen is a proprietary form of 3D printing technology that allows scientists to assemble living tissue cells into a desired pattern. When combined with an extracellular matrix In biology, the extracellular matrix (ECM), also called intercellula ...

MMX Bioprinter for 3D bioprinting..

Operations

The company bioprints and markets human tissues as a means of accelerating the preclinical drug testing and discovery process, enabling treatments to be created more quickly and at lower cost, and without immediate risks to living test subjects. Organovo has long-term expectations that this technology could be suitable for surgical therapy and transplantation. Organovo also partners with biopharmaceutical companies and academic medical centers to design, build, and validate more predictive ''in vitro'' tissues for disease modeling and

toxicology Toxicology is a scientific discipline, overlapping with biology, chemistry, pharmacology, and medicine, that involves the study of the adverse effects of chemical substances on living organisms and the practice of diagnosing and treating e ...

. The living test tissues provide researchers the opportunity to test drugs before administering the drug to a living person; this bridges the gap between preclinical testing and

clinical trial Clinical trials are prospective biomedical or behavioral research studies on human participants designed to answer specific questions about biomedical or behavioral interventions, including new treatments (such as novel vaccines, drugs, diet ...

s. Organovo is actively developing its technology with the intention of eventually being able to replicate entire human organs for transplant. , the company's

executive vice-president A vice president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vice president is on ...

of commercial operations was Mike Renard. In 2015, Organovo signed an agreement to provide processes and technology to produce 3D printed human skin to L'Oreal for use in testing the safety and efficacy of cosmetic products.

3D bioprinting process

The human body is made up of different cell types and many technologies for printing these cells vary in their ability to ensure stability and viability of the cells during the manufacturing process. The methods used for 3D bioprinting of cells are photolithography, magnetic 3D bioprinting,

stereolithography Stereolithography (SLA or SL; also known as vat photopolymerisation, optical fabrication, photo-solidification, or resin printing) is a form of 3D printing technology used for creating models, prototypes, patterns, and production parts in a lay ...

, and direct cell

extrusion Extrusion is a process used to create objects of a fixed cross-sectional profile by pushing material through a die of the desired cross-section. Its two main advantages over other manufacturing processes are its ability to create very complex ...

. In each process, a physical

biopsy A biopsy is a medical test commonly performed by a surgeon, interventional radiologist, or an interventional cardiologist. The process involves extraction of sample cells or tissues for examination to determine the presence or extent of a dise ...

of an organ is required. Certain cells from the biopsy are isolated and multiplied. These cells are then mixed with a liquefied material that provides oxygen and other nutrients to keep them alive outside of the human body. The mixture is then placed in a printer cartridge and structured using the patients’ medical scans.

Financing

Organovo went public on OTC markets in 2012 via a reverse merger with shell company Real Estate Restoration and Rental, Inc. In July 2013, Organovo uplisted to the NYSE MKT. The company hit of market cap high of $700m in 2013. At the time of listing, Organovo had 22.4 million shares outstanding. Today there are over 130 million.

Public Awareness

Gabor Forgacs, the scientific founder of Organovo, promoted medical bioprinting in a

TEDMED TEDMED is an annual conference focusing on health and medicine, with a year-round web-based community. TEDMED is an independent event operating under license from the nonprofit TED (conference), TED conference. Background , TEDMED staff oper ...

presentation in 2011. He discussed how bioprinting may solve problems that pertain to organ shortages and high medical costs.

References

{{reflist Companies listed on the Nasdaq Health care companies based in California Biotechnology companies of the United States Companies based in San Diego American companies established in 2007