Technology and Utilization of the 3D Cell Culture Method

In the conventional two-dimensional culture method, cells are grown on a flat surface of a culture dish or container. It has been pointed out that the properties of these cells are different from those of living organisms. Various three-dimensional culture methods have been developed to solve the problems. In three-dimensional culture, various scaffolds for three-dimensional surfaces or gels that contain extracellular matrix molecules are used to allow cells to grow three-dimensionally. When multiple types of cells are cultured together in the three-dimensional environment, cell–cell interactions and cell functions in intravital environments can be reproduced. Cell clusters called spheroids, which can be produced by keeping cells from adhering to the bottom of the container, and organoids, which function like organs composed of multiple cell types, are also part of the three-dimensional culture method. These are used in the fields of cancer research, drug screening, regenerative medicine, and tissue engineering and are also expected to be very important in reproducing various phenomena that take place between cells in vivo. Furthermore, three-dimensional cultured skin using human cells and three-dimensional cultured cartilage for autografts have been commercialized as alternative methods for animal experiments and are already being used clinically as well as in the research field.