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  • Review Article
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Advanced technologies for the preservation of mammalian biospecimens

Nature Biomedical Engineering volume 5, pages 793–804 (2021)Cite this article

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Abstract

The three classical core technologies for the preservation of live mammalian biospecimens—slow freezing, vitrification and hypothermic storage—limit the biomedical applications of biospecimens. In this Review, we summarize the principles and procedures of these three technologies, highlight how their limitations are being addressed via the combination of microfabrication and nanofabrication, materials science and thermal-fluid engineering and discuss the remaining challenges.

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Fig. 1: Preservation of mammalian biospecimens.
Fig. 2: Phase diagrams, and thermal and osmotic time courses, for five main biospecimen-preservation methods.
Fig. 3: Slow freezing.
Fig. 4: Vitrification.
Fig. 5: Hypothermic storage.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge partial funding for this work from NIH grants P41EB002503 and R01EB023632, NSF grant CBET-1831019 and NSFC grant 52076157 and from Xi’an Jiaotong University (Young Talent Support Program).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Engineering in Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School and Shriners Hospitals for Children, Boston, MA, USA

    Haishui Huang & Martin L. Yarmush

  2. Bioinspired Engineering and Biomechanics Center, The Key Laboratory of Biomedical Information Engineering of Ministry of Education, School of Life Science and Technology, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, China

    Haishui Huang

  3. Fischell Department of Bioengineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA

    Xiaoming He

  4. Robert E. Fischell Institute for Biomedical Devices, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA

    Xiaoming He

  5. Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of Maryland, Baltimore, MD, United States

    Xiaoming He

  6. Department of Biomedical Engineering, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ, USA

    Martin L. Yarmush

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H.H. and M.L.Y. conceived the project. H.H. performed the literature review and wrote the manuscript draft. H.H. and X.H. discussed the content and revised the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Haishui Huang, Xiaoming He or Martin L. Yarmush.

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Huang, H., He, X. & Yarmush, M.L. Advanced technologies for the preservation of mammalian biospecimens. Nat Biomed Eng 5, 793–804 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41551-021-00784-z

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