Lab-on-a-chip: An Emerging Analytical Tool for Drug Testing

Abstract

There are indications that more than 90% of drug development endeavours for clinical uses were unsuccessful despite employing various experimentally proven strategies. This observation necessitates looking closely at whether some key drug optimisation processes are disregarded during preclinical trials. The factors that need to be strictly considered for drug delivery systems include rapid and high-throughput screening technologies with accurate and quicker dispensing of small liquid volumes and considering the biological design of certain tissues with their specific biomechanical properties to mimic conditions presented in vivo. Microfluidics systems have garnered much attention to provide a quicker, reproducible, and more affordable substitute to deliver drugs in a targeted and controlled manner. The purpose of this chapter is to provide the most recent developments in the construction of in vitro microfluidic designs that could be utilized for cell and tissue drug administration. In a subsequent section, we have comprehensively discussed their benefits and obstacles they still need to overcome to become a cornerstone of pharmaceutical research.