Liver and Chips

The early stages of disease are often difficult to spot, especially when they involve delicate communication between cells and tissues. Here researchers explore the early stages of liver diseases using cells grown on an artificial circuit or 'chip'. We see groups of liver cells (highlighted in magenta) surrounded by blood vessels (green) carrying fluid (blue). The researchers used their liver-on-a-chip to mimic insulin resistance, often found in type 2 diabetes, by bathing the liver cells in high levels of glucose, insulin and fatty acids. Similar to the real disease, fatty acids interfered with insulin’s normal role of encouraging the liver to soak up glucose. The team also use their new tool to investigate liver changes in metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), raising hopes for more widespread research and treatment in the future.

Written by John Ankers

John Ankers

Writer

A former researcher in systems biology, John is now an online biology tutor and professional coach supporting the wellbeing of scientists and NHS professionals. He's writing, too, of course.

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• Image from work by Erin N. Tevonian and Ellen L. Kan, and colleagues
• Department of Biological Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA
• Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution – NonCommercial – NoDerivs (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
• Published in Nature Communications, January 2026