Organoids in gastrointestinal diseases: from bench to clinic

This review is led by Dr. Yanlei Ma (Department of Oncology, Shanghai Medical College of Fudan University, Department of Colorectal Surgery, Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center). The research team noticed the shortcomings of the most widely used models at present — cells lines and mouse models — in studying the molecular mechanism of gastrointestinal diseases (GI). The former ones may lose the heterogeneity of the primary tumor cells after several times of passages, while the latter ones exhibit a high cost of time consuming and resources during the disease modeling. “Under these circumstances, organoids models bring out new insight into the biomedical studies,” Ma says.

The etiology of GI diseases is intricate and multifactorial, encompassing complex interactions between genetic predisposition and gut microbiota. The cell fate change, immune function regulation, and microenvironment composition in diseased tissues are governed by microorganisms and mutated genes either independently or through synergistic interactions. Thus, a comprehensive understanding of GI disease etiology is imperative for developing precise prevention and treatment strategies.

The research group first describes the development history of organoids models, followed by a detailed demonstration of organoids application from bench to clinic. As for bench utilization, the researchers present a layer-by-layer elucidation of organoid simulation on host–microbial interactions, as well as the application in molecular mechanism analysis. As for clinical adhibition, they pro-vide a generalized interpretation of organoid application in GI disease simulation from inflammatory disorders to malignancy diseases, as well as in GI disease treatment including drug screening, immunotherapy, and microbial-targeting and screening treatment.

Taken together, this review draws a comprehensive and systematical depiction of organoids models, providing a novel insight into the utilization of organoids models from bench to clinic.