Three-dimensional artificial tissue structures can assemble themselves when shaken with a little oil, report Ali Khademhosseini at Harvard Medical School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and his co-workers.
The researchers made use of the tendency of water and oil to repel one other to force water-loving microgels — polymers packed with cells — to form straight lines and other shapes (such as the cross attached to three rods, pictured).
The hydrophilic microgels minimized their surfaces' contact with the oil by stacking closely together. The structures were later fixed in place by a cross-linking reaction.
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Tissue engineering: To rig with oil. Nature 454, 257 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/454257c
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/454257c
