Preterm rabbit-derived Precision Cut Lung Slices as alternative model of bronchopulmonary dysplasia in preclinical study: a morphological fine-tuning approach

Perspectives on precision cut lung slices—powerful tools for investigation of mechanisms and therapeutic targets in lung diseases

“…Increases in airway but not vascular reactivity have been demonstrated in mice PCLS a double-hit in vivo model of bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) ( Royce et al, 2016 ; Bui et al, 2019 ). More recently, PCLS from preterm rabbits were used in an in vitro model of BPD, in which septal defects and other structural abnormalities could be induced by hyperoxia ( Ragionieri et al, 2023 ). While recognizing that further refinement may be required to mimic the influence of cyclical stretch from ventilation on development, further studies using PCLS from BPD and other early life models may provide novel insights into pathways involved in septation and identify potential therapeutic targets to enhance alveolarization.…”

“…A recent methods chapter on mouse PCLS culture provides an excellent overview of both preparation and protocols for numerous useful experimental outputs including imaging for contractility studies, collagen and elastin imaging, mean linear intercept (MLI) measurement of alveolar airspace size, immunofluorescent staining and preparation of decellularized PCLS (Wu et al, 2019). A separate study in rabbit PCLS supports their use for some histomorphometric results such as tissue density and alveolar septal thickness, but suggests that MLI and septal may be confounded by agar infusion (Ragionieri et al, 2023).…”

Precision cut lung slices: an integrated ex vivo model for studying lung physiology, pharmacology, disease pathogenesis and drug discovery

“…For BPD, the hyperoxia and mechanical ventilation that are necessary for ventilation of premature newborn lungs causes damage to the lungs that can persist long-term. Few studies exist using PCLS to examine mechanisms of pathology of BPD [93,[97][98][99] or ARDS [100,101] and even fewer have studied mechanisms of pulmonary hypertension [102,103]. Despite a lack of extensive studies, PCLS may provide insight into the pathophysiology and discovery of new therapeutic approaches in the treatment of pulmonary vascular diseases.…”