Vaginal health is difficult to study in a lab setting partly because laboratory animals have totally different microbiomes than humans do.
Organs-on-a-chip mimic real bodily function, making it easier to study diseases and test drugs. In this case, the tissue acts like that of a real vagina in some important ways, responding to changes in estrogen by adjusting the expression of certain genes. It can also grow a humanlike microbiome dominated by "good" or "bad" bacteria.
https://microbiomejournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40168-022-01400-1
@thewebrecluse -For decades I was wondering when we will have enough data and tech compiled to run accurate human bio simulations without the need for lab animals, and here we are at the start! Thanks for posting this.,
@MBriatack1 Happy to share! I love articles like this. There is so much being developed and discovered and especially ANYTHING that really helps women's health is also such a nice read since that is so often a neglected area of study. 😂 This is great news and FASCINATING stuff ❤️
In case science journals aren't an easy read for you, Scientific American has a good writeup on this technology.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/first-vagina-on-a-chip-will-help-researchers-test-drugs/