Pharmaceutical Companies

Pharmaceutical companies sometimes have to pull new drugs off the market because they harm our livers. The drugs may have been tested on liver cells from rats, or on human cells that are nearly dead. But these kinds of tests do a poor job of [mimicking:segmenting] real livers.Now researchers at MIT have developed a better method. They've created a colony of human liver cells that act like the real thing. The [research:article] was published in the journal Nature Biotechnology. The cell colonies are only 500 millionths of a meter in diameter. [Researchers:Biologists] arrange the cells on a plate in much the same way as copper wires are placed on computer chips.These micro livers mimic the actions of real livers - including [producing:creating] enzymes necessary to break down drugs and other toxins. The tiny organs last for six weeks. So they can [evaluate:calculate] the effects of drugs over a longer time period than current tests. A start-up company has licenced the technology and is [preparing:leaving] it for market. The little livers could be cheaper and more accurate than drug tests now used.