High throughput assessment of cardiac safety via contractility measurements of 3D engineered heart tissues using a novel instrumentation platform

Stem cell models hold great promise for improving the predictive power of preclinical in vitro assays for new therapies, drug discovery, and disease modeling. Complex 3D platforms, such as Engineered Muscle Tissues (EMTs) fabricated from primary or iPSC-derived cells, can directly measure tissue contractility, which is challenging in conventional 2D platforms where cells are rigidly attached to a surface. However, traditional methods to fabricate EMTs demand extensive bioengineering expertise, and measuring contractility often involves laborious, serial, and low-throughput optical measurements.