We caught up with Senior Scientist, Oliver Culley…

1. How long have you been at CN Bio? What were your first impressions?

I joined CN Bio in November 2023, having worked as a research scientist for more than 10 years in both academia and industry. I was warmly welcomed into the company by every member of the team. It was clear right from the beginning how passionate and kind my new colleagues were. Looking forward, I am keen to help achieve CN Bio’s ambitious goals for the year ahead.

2. Describe your role at the company

As a Senior Scientist in the R&D team, I am responsible for furthering our contributions in the NAFLD/NASH research field. My day-to-day involves the effective management of several projects, as well as supervising junior team members, and collaborating with others in the business to ensure CN Bio remains competitive, innovative, and able to fulfill customer needs.

3. What is the most interesting aspect of your job?

As a part of the R&D team, there is great scope to elevate CN Bio’s products and solutions to reach new heights that align with the current and emerging needs of an evolving industry. I enjoy the freedom to learn and develop each day. I am excited to see how the work we do in R&D impacts marketing, production, and other areas of the business to ultimately help our customers fulfill their goals.

4. How does the company support employees in achieving a good work-life balance?

As a father of two young boys (3 years and 10 months), it is important to me that I can progress in my career and be there for my family at the same time. CN Bio allows me to do just this. With a recognition culture, and clear and kind leadership, I know that the team around me values not only my work output but also my health, and the well-being of my family. This provides the right environment for each employee and team to succeed.

5. How does the company support employees in achieving their career goals?

CN Bio’s targets and opportunities are described clearly through regular one-to-one, team-centric, and company-wide meetings. I am able to discuss my responsibilities, challenges, career goals, and ambitions through appraisals and catch-ups with my line manager. I am offered flexibility and independence with my workload, which makes me feel trusted and valued; and allows me to develop as a scientist.

6. Do you feel like you have a voice in the company?

Despite having only been at CN Bio for a short time I feel heard, and that my opinion is important. I have been actively encouraged to give feedback and feel safe to do so. In my experience, this is not always the culture in businesses. You cannot simply talk into existence a ‘speak-up’ culture, it comes through mutual trust across the organization.

We sat down with Uranbileg (Una) Myagmarsuren, one of our Development Engineers, to talk about what ignited her passion for Organ-on-a-chip (OOC), and what led her to join CN Bio.

Ever wondered about the intricate work that goes into developing a Multi-organ-on-a-chip model? Una gives us an interesting overview of what a day in the life of a Development Engineer looks like. Read on to discover Una’s fascinating insights into the challenges her team encountered when developing our industry-leading OOC models.

1. Tell us more about your academic and career history and how that led you to your role at CN Bio?

My undergraduate degree was in Biomedical Materials. I have always had an interest in Biology – I enjoyed learning about it at school, but for my degree, I wanted to focus on a specialized area of Biology. When I was researching universities, I visited Queen Mary University of London on their open day and there was a stall with medical implants that were used in reconstructive surgeries. I found it really interesting, and that gave me a new direction into what I wanted to do – a degree incorporating Engineering and Biology!

After I graduated, I joined a medical devices company, which feels like a long time ago now. It was my first job out of university, and I worked there for 9 months, helping to develop the Company’s blood gas analyzer. That was around the time I came across CN Bio, when they were relocating their head office from Welwyn Garden City to the Cambridge Science Park. This meant the Company was growing and looking to expand their teams, which worked out well for me! So, here I am now, part of the Product Development team, working as a Development Engineer.

2. How long have you been with CN Bio, and what do you enjoy most about your role?

I joined CN Bio in November of 2019, which is quite a few years ago now! The people and the culture are definitely at the top of my list of what I enjoy most here. I like working with all my colleagues and I don’t think I’ve yet encountered a single person here that I don’t enjoy working with.

Another aspect of the job, which is important to me, is the variety they offer in the projects I work on. I am simultaneously involved in different things, so I am never stuck repeating the same tasks every day. This means, I get to improve my skills in multiple areas, and it is never boring coming to work.

We have a dedicated group of volunteers – The Social Gang- that organizes different activities for the employees. For example, just a few weeks ago, they arranged an evening of Go Karting and the entire venue was booked for CN Bio! Although, as you can expect in England, it was raining on the day, it was really good fun, nonetheless.

3. What would you say is your greatest accomplishment since joining the company?

While the company has achieved many of their important milestones since I started, and my team was involved in the projects, I have a personal achievement to share which I am very proud of.

When I started at CN Bio, I had not used CAD or SolidWorks; I was a beginner with rudimentary skills. However, on this job, I’ve had the opportunity to use the software and develop the skills to use it effectively with confidence. I am now certified for both the Associate and Professional levels of CAD. Additionally, I’ve used the skills to independently design rigs for our projects. To give you some context, if you are not that familiar with our products – a rig is a sub-assembly used for our liver models. It consists of four small parts, and we need forty-eight of those for every single PhysioMimix® Liver-48 plate that we manufacture. Of course, time is money, and productivity would be rather poor if we had to do these, one at a time, by hand. So, I produced a rig, that allows us to punch the whole thing out at once. That means, it now comes together in a single press and is assembled in one go. This drastically improves the efficiency of the process and minimizes human error.

4. What initially sparked your interest in the field of bioengineering?

I don’t know if you remember, some time ago, there was a Channel 4 documentary – How to Build a Bionic Man. I was fascinated by the show; how they combined technology and non-biological materials and got it to work with the human body. My initial inspiration for my journey into biomaterials was medical implants, and that’s exactly the sector I wanted to build my career in. However, it’s a niche market and finding opportunities as a fresh graduate was more challenging than I had initially anticipated, so I opened my mind about where else my skills could be applied.

I am pleased I found my way into Organ-on-a-chip. Even though it’s vastly different from where I initially thought my career would take me, I’m excited to be here. At CN Bio, we’re developing a technology that aims to improve the drug discovery process, bringing much-needed treatments to the masses faster, cheaper and with less animal testing, that also reduces risks during in vivo and clinical trials.

Although Organ-on-a-chip technology has been around for a couple of decades, it is still a relatively recent technology. If you know the market, you’ll agree that there are a lot of prototypes, mostly developed and used by research groups at universities, but there aren’t many platforms that are fully functional. And that’s what we do at CN Bio, we can give our customers commercially validated technology that they can readily implement in their studies.

5. What does a day in your role look like and what is the focus of the work you do at CN Bio?

That’s always a difficult question to answer, especially when you are the type of person who seeks out opportunities to work on different projects on a regular basis!

So, an average day for me can vary quite a bit. Some days involve cleaning and inspecting parts, which may sound simple, but can easily take up half a workday. It involves being at the microscope, inspecting features on the plates and taking measurements. It’s much more interesting than it sounds! For example, the tests could be part of a validation process to ensure the parts match certain test criteria. My day can involve checking consumables to make sure they are working after gamma sterilization, or assessing the flow rates to see if it matches what the experimental design requires.

Mostly, my tasks are performed in the engineering lab, but sometimes I work in the Biology lab, for example when I am working on collagen coating our scaffolds. These scaffolds go into our consumables and provide a platform for our cells to grow into functional 3D structures.

Being part of the small engineering team also has its perks – I’m exposed to a lot more than I would be at a larger corporation. I’ve had the chance to use a pillar drill to modify parts and make breaks out of wooden blocks, and much more.

6. CN Bio also develops multi-organ models – How do these differ from single-organ models? What extra challenges do they pose?

Our multi-organ consumable plates have two compartments, essentially being two single-organ models that are connected by fluidic flow. We have a multi-organ model, the Gut/Liver-on-a-chip, which can be used to assess the action of both the gut and the liver on therapeutic compounds. The design for this model is more complex than its single-organ counterparts and incorporates more pumps and valves. We continually improve the design and utility of our consumables and have now developed a better pump and valve design for our multi-organ models.

When it comes down to the consumable plate design, we must consider the biology, manufacturing logistics, materials, costs, and time. As a business, we have to make sure our products are both useful for the customer and commercially viable for us.

7. What developments do you think we will see in the Organ-on-a-chip space in the next 5 years?

In the coming years, I expect to see a movement towards higher throughput systems. This will enable scientists to increase the number of drugs and different conditions they can test simultaneously. Biological experiments tend to be costly, so providing researchers with solutions that combine multi-organ systems with higher throughput capabilities could be a game changer in the next 5 years.

Inspired to learn more about our Organ-on-a-chip technology? Visit our brand-new Organ-on-a-chip Technology page to learn more!

In this series, we’ll be diving deep into the lives and minds of our diverse staff members through a fun and engaging Q&A format. In each blog, we’ll spotlight a different team member, uncovering their unique journeys, professional insights, and personal passions. From the creative thinkers in our engineering department to the innovative minds in our scientific team. Without further ado!…

1. How long have you been at CN Bio and why do you choose to stay?

I joined CN Bio in August of 2018 and have been fortunate to witness the company’s impressive growth firsthand. It’s been inspiring to see the core values, which resonate with my own, remain steadfast throughout this expansion. CN Bio has fostered my personal development. I’ve been empowered to learn and flourish, acquiring new skills through collaboration with experienced colleagues and mentors.  I have built many meaningful relationships while at this company, underscored by the importance of working together to achieve success.

2. Describe your role at the company. What is the most interesting aspect of your job?

As a Senior Development Engineer, I play a pivotal role in bringing our products from concept to commercial reality – throughout design, concept prototyping, problem solving, and validation. I work closely with Project Managers and cross-functional teams including our Manufacturing and Bio-assay Development teams, to facilitate seamless collaboration throughout the entire process. My role extends beyond new product development, I also provide support where necessary for improvements to our existing portfolio of consumables, hardware, and system.

The most interesting aspect of my job is the collaborative nature of my team. I don’t just work with my fellow engineers but continually come together with passionate scientists, creative problem-solvers, and commercial-minded leaders. This vibrant mix of expertise fuel our collective mission to transform the landscape of drug development.

3. How would you describe the company culture?

CN Bio truly fosters a great work environment, where employees feel valued, empowered, and respected. Our company culture is a vibrant blend of innovation, fueled by scientific curiosity, and a passionate drive to deliver results. Collaboration is at the heart of everything we do, and our success lies in the power of our teamwork.

4. Do you feel like you have a voice in the company?

CN Bio fosters a culture of open communication, where our opinions are valued, and all employees actively contribute to the ever-enriching conversation. The commitment to open communication creates an atmosphere that allows me to feel heard.

5. What opportunities are there for socializing and connecting outside of work?

CN Bio has a dedicated team – The Social Gang. Members volunteers their time and efforts to organize engaging social events throughout the year. From large-scale celebrations like our Christmas Party to casual after-work gatherings in our kitchen, they make sure we always have fantastic opportunities to connect and build relationships outside the daily grind. The Social Gang is always open to new ideas and welcomes ideas from everyone in the company. Catch a glimpse of what we do on our social media channels.

6. What is your favorite thing about working at CN Bio?

CN Bio truly embodies its core value of being more than just a job. This philosophy resonates deeply with me, and it is what makes working here so rewarding. We’ve fostered a professional environment that not only supports dedicated work but also injects a healthy dose of fun and camaraderie. This fantastic blend allows us to build genuine connections with colleagues, fostering a friendly atmosphere that fuels our collective success.

You can learn more about what the CN Bio team is up by following us on LinkedIn.

In this series, we’ll be diving deep into the lives and minds of our diverse staff members through a fun and engaging Q&A format. In each blog, we’ll spotlight a different team member, uncovering their unique journeys, professional insights, and personal passions. From the creative thinkers in our engineering department to the innovative minds in our scientific team. Without further ado!…

Before jetting off to Seattle to join other leading Microphysiological system (MPS) experts at this year’s MPS World Summit, we sat down with Dr. Dharaminder Singh, our Lead Engineer for Consumables. Read on to learn more about his role at CN Bio, what led him here, and most importantly, what ignited his passion for developing innovative new organ-on-a-chip (OOC) models.

If you’re also heading to the MPS World Summit next week, get in contact to schedule a time to meet with Dharaminder and our team – we’d love to see you there!

1. Can you tell us more about your career leading up to your role at CN Bio and what attracted you to the Company?

I’ve always been a problem solver, and this interest led me to do an undergraduate degree in Bioengineering. My undergrad course was quite multidisciplinary and touched on many topics, but the problem-solving element was always there. During my Masters in Bioengineering, we covered several different topics and areas of interest, which meant that I developed an understanding of a broad range of subjects. At times, these were not covered in great depth, but we had a good overview of each of the different areas, including organ chips and chip-based devices, something I quickly developed a keen interest in.

After finishing my Master’s degree I continued my education by embarking on a PhD in Bioengineering, moving more into applications of polymers and biomaterials. I developed novel formulations of a polymer, which was successfully utilized as scaffolds for applications such as nerve guidance conduits, embryonic stem cells, cartilage, and cancer models. I then worked in a few labs across Sheffield, including our core bioengineering labs, and at the Medical and Dental Schools.

Following the PhD, I came across an opportunity at CN Bio, which was well aligned with what I was looking for, because of the problem-solving nature of the role. CN Bio was a lot smaller back then so we had to bridge several different roles at any given time – something I felt very comfortable with owing to the multidisciplinary nature of my undergraduate degree. Because of my broad experience in chip devices, from engineering to biology, I could be both the end user and the engineer designing the products. That’s what really attracted me to the role!

2. How long have you been with CN Bio, and what do you enjoy most about your role?

I joined CN Bio in 2017, which seems an age ago now! The one thing I’ve enjoyed most is the number of different people we interact with, but of course, the company, our technology, and the broader problem we are trying to solve are all exciting too. I am passionate about Organ-on-a-Chip and New Alternate Methodologies (NAMs) in general and believe they will become a core focus for the Drug Discovery and Development industry.

In my role, I enjoy utilizing a broad range of the skills I’ve gained from past experiences and, of course, the opportunity to build upon them. There’s an engineering aspect to my job, so I interact daily with our engineers and also lead the consumables team, which is exciting. However, I am also involved with the biology side of our business. Having that understanding of biology and bioengineering is advantageous, as it means I can bridge the gap between the disciplines and answer the broad range of questions that arise. My current role also has a customer-facing element, where I engage with customers to address their queries. Essentially, I am involved in products from their initial conception to market delivery and beyond. I get to see a product through its entire life cycle, which I enjoy tremendously.

3. What are the greatest accomplishments you have made, since joining the company?

A major milestone for me was releasing our first PhysioMimix® OOC System into the market in 2018 – we were a significantly smaller team back then and it was a big achievement. It wasn’t just a personal victory but an enormous accomplishment within the company. Being part of the first product released was incredible!

Subsequently, we have launched several Multi-chip plates and consumables. Every new product we bring to the market still feels like a great accomplishment. I am particularly proud of the most recent ones, especially the PhysioMimix Multichip Liver-48 – our higher throughput plate, as I led the great team that developed this product and directly contributed. The PhysioMimix Liver-48 plate replicates the intricacy of our Liver-on-a-chip model in a higher throughput format. It enables a significantly higher number of experiments to be performed simultaneously compared to other microphysiological systems (MPS). The design also enhances the user experience/usability. Collectively, this is what makes this particular project especially special.

I am delighted to see how the CN Bio team has grown – the dynamics between individuals are outstanding – we grow, develop, and continue to learn together. We’re trying to push the boundaries of what people know, what we know, what the industry knows, and we are always working hard to stretch those limits. We listen to the market’s needs to develop solutions to support their demands – all of which is an accomplishment to be celebrated, in my opinion!

4. What does a day in your job look like and what is the focus of the work you do at CN Bio?

If I’m not careful, my day can be overrun with meetings! Thankfully, we work hard to ensure we don’t have a follow-on meeting culture here at CN Bio. I lead the consumable development team, and we always have multiple projects in progress at any given time. So, I’m likely to be in conversations with our technical teams, discussing the challenges and solving problems, or updating our stakeholders, asking them to weigh in on final decisions about product design.

Each project has internal and external stakeholders to ensure the projects and sub-tasks are where we want them to be. So, my role involves project management and stakeholder management. In terms of a breakdown, my role has reduced from being 80% technical to about 30 to 40% in the time I have been with the company. I am not in the lab often, but I do provide advice on tests and experiments when needed.

5. What first ignited your interest in bioengineering and organ-on-a-chip?

When I was younger, like many other prospective undergrads, I wanted to go into Medicine. While researching university courses, I came across a course in biomaterials and tissue engineering. Tissue engineering has a lot in common with what we do here at CN Bio now, but at that time it was still an emerging field. Not many universities were offering the course, which also piqued my interest. In addition, the fact that the course involved culturing and proliferating cells in the lab, nurturing them to function as they do in the body and then placing them back into the organism, really interested me. My undergraduate transitioned into a Master’s degree, then a PhD, during which I uncovered my passion for research.

The move to OOC from bioengineering was a slight step change because that wasn’t always my core focus. Although I had done some work with organ chips, most of my work was focused on tissue engineering, but again the emerging nature of OOC meant that when the opportunity for the change in direction came up, I jumped at it!

6. From an engineering perspective, what are the challenges to overcome when developing a new OOC model?

I think that’s a great question because the immediate response most people, including me, expect to hear is the technical side of things. For example, we need the design to function like this to ensure the biology works like that, which is 100% true, but frequently the usability aspect is forgotten. Here at CN Bio, we want to make sure that not only does the product work, but it works reliably and reproducibly, and that it’s simple enough for anyone with cell culture experience to use. Usability is therefore central to our product design.

My focus area is consumables, so the materials we use to make our devices, (including the coating chemistry), represent another challenge. Additionally, ensuring that we deliver a physiologically relevant flow of the media (to mimic the bloodstream) within our human organ models and between them in multi-organ systems represents a crucial element of PhysioMimix functionality. Fluidic flow enables shear stress, nutrient exchange, and oxygen transport, so, every part of the consumable’s design is vital to retain the viability and function of the organ model over extended culture times.

7. How important do you think close relationships with independent committees and regulatory bodies are to ensuring advancing NAMs research and awareness?

CN Bio is part of a few regulatory groups such as Critical Path Institute (C-Path), which is developing a framework within the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for MPS device use. In Europe, we are also part of the standardization work in CEN-CENELEC (European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization). In my opinion, being a part of these groups is important. We’re passionate about advancing NAMs, and being engaged in conversations with regulatory authorities helps propagate that message; on the other hand, it also enables us to understand how to continue advancing these technologies.

It’s also encouraging to see developments in the area of NAMs within government across the globe, such as the approval of the FDA Modernization Act 2.0, the UK announcing a £20 million budget for the 3Rs – Replacement, Reduction, and Refinement, and developments in other countries such as Canada and India, who are also pushing forward the NAMs agenda – which is exciting!

(I’m proud to be a member of the Animals in Science Committee but my comments here are not representing the ASC and any questions related to that should be sent to the ASC secretariat.)

8. This is an exciting time for the new alternative methodology (NAM) sector. What do you think the future holds for the use of animals in science, and new technologies such as OOC?

Yes, we’re seeing a lot of change within the NAM sector overall, and specifically within the MPS space. This is mainly because the models that are being developed are very context-of-use driven i.e., they are specifically designed to solve a particular research problem. This is a great development within the community – we’re providing solutions to industry-voiced problems, rather than providing solutions and then trying to fit the solution to the problem.

It is likely that animal use in science will remain for the immediate future. However, there are areas where OOC can be used to prevent unnecessary animal use, or even to safeguard animal use. The prior use of OOC to test for efficacy or toxicity ahead of in vivo studies can help narrow down the number of drugs/justify their progression into animals. ADME OOC studies can be utilized to refine dosage. Additionally, we are seeing a new wave of molecules with human-specific targets. Here animal use is less suited to their testing, so OOC offers a potential path forward where no other viable options exist.

The main development I expect to see in the future is a strong drive for standardization. Particularly now, as more people start to understand the potential benefits of OOC. While standardization is key for broad adoption and we need it to validate certain MPS models, the approach must maintain some balance. We don’t want strict standardization practices that stifle innovation and creativity. Many companies have adopted MPS to gain a competitive advantage, however, as the field progresses and MPS becomes a common experimental tool within more regulated aspects of the drug development workflow, their standardization will become more important.

Looking to the future, we anticipate that OOC data will become more common in regulatory submissions. The Drug Discovery and Development process is long but we’re making progress. At the end of 2023, we were delighted to announce that PhysioMimix data supported a successful regulatory submission for INI-822 targeting a fibrotic liver disorder. I expect you will see us achieve more and more milestones within the MPS space in the foreseeable future.