Culture of Breast Cancer Spheroids in a Do-it-Yourself Incubator: Introducing Students to Tissue Engineering

Hands-on training in tissue engineering is often associated with specialized labs and expensive equipment, such as CO₂ incubators. To minimize the use of costly commercial incubators and provide a more vivid engineering experience in a biology lab, we present a hands-on project that introduces medium to large groups of undergraduate or graduate students to tissue engineering. This project involves the culture of breast cancer spheroids in a do-it-yourself (DiY) incubator.

Students were divided into teams (three to four members) and provided with a kit to assemble a DiY incubator for Eppendorf tubes. The students also received Eppendorf tubes containing spheroids derived from MCF7 breast cancer cells, fresh culture medium, and syringes. A perception survey was applied to the students before and after the activity. The students were able to incubate their spheroids at a constant temperature of 37 °C in their DiY incubators and keep them alive and metabolically active for several days, by changing the medium using the components of the kit (syringes and fresh culture medium) in a laminar hood.

The students successfully documented the progression of the culture by following glucose consumption with a portable commercial glucometer, the changes in size of the spheroids, or the changes in color of the culture medium (from pink to yellow) using a smartphone and image analysis applications. Students learned basic techniques associated with cell culture and tissue incubation. After participating in the cell culture experiment, students perceived tissue engineering as more appealing, simpler (easier or clearer), and better structured than before the hands-on activity.

This simple research-based project illustrates key aspects of tissue engineering (i.e., the need to control temperature, maintain sterility, and renew nutrients to culture live tissues), while exposing students to a real hands-on project that they can do in a typical biological laboratory by assembling and using DiY incubators instead of depending on multiple and costly commercial CO₂ incubators.