Intestinal Organoids

Over the last decade, the use of mini-organ or organoids has been increasingly developed in fundamental research. Indeed, digestive organoids represent an essential advance compared to classical culture systems (epithelial cell lines, immortalized cells) since they preserve in culture the functional complexity present in vivo (architecture, different cell types). They also have the advantage of being able to be propagated indefinitely (unlike explants), minimizing the use of animal models and reducing the amount of tissue required. Finally, their growth and development depends on the origin of the sample (the organoid will develop differently if the cell source comes from a patient suffering from an inflammatory bowel disease, for example), thus generating models of human pathologies to better determine their physiopathology. The use of organoids in biomedical research has proven to be an indispensable tool for the understanding of cellular and molecular mechanisms involved in epithelial renewal and the screening of molecules and ingredients for applications in the health and agri-food sectors.