Emulate launches AVA emulation system to accelerate drug development with first-of-its-kind high-throughput organ-chip platform

Emulate, Inc. has launched the AVA^™ Emulation System, a self-contained instrument that cultures, incubates, and images up to 96 independent organ-chip samples in a single run.

AVA delivers an unprecedented magnitude of in vivo-level insights faster than animal models while cutting consumable costs four-fold and in-lab labor by half compared to current generation technologies. These transformative capabilities give the pharmaceutical industry the practical means to pivot beyond animal testing and into truly human-relevant territory.

AVA Emulation System: Three instruments in one

AVA is the first self-contained organ-on-a-chip workstation to fuse high-throughput microfluidic tissue culture, full environmental control, and real-time imaging into a single, compact benchtop unit.

Key performance gains include:

• Expanded experimental power – 96 independent organ-chip samples in a single run enable researchers to achieve microplate-level scale of their organ-chip experiments, enabling side-by-side comparison of dozens of compounds, doses, or stimuli.
• Lower operating costs – AVA achieves a four-fold drop in consumable spend and up to 50% fewer cells and media per sample compared to previous generation technology.
• Time and labor savings – Hands-on, in-lab time is reduced by more than half, thanks to automated microscopy, remote monitoring, and the revolutionary new Chip-Array^™ consumable that integrates 12 independent organ-chips into an SBS format for streamlined workflows with multichannel pipettes and automated liquid handlers.
• AI-ready datasets – A typical seven-day experiment can generate >30,000 time-stamped data points from daily imaging and effluent assays, with post-takedown omics pushing the total into the millions — providing a rich, multi-modal foundation to feed machine-learning pipelines for target discovery, lead optimization, and safety prediction.

A timely answer to shifting regulations

With the FDA targeting animal studies to become 'the exception rather than the norm;, the need for proven human models is urgent. Emulate’s Liver-Chip S1 — the first and only organ-chip admitted to the FDA’s ISTAND program — has already outperformed animals, showing 87% sensitivity and 100% specificity for drug-induced liver injury in a 2022 Communications Medicine study. AVA now scales that level of human relevance across discovery, efficacy, and toxicology screens, accelerating safer therapies through the pipeline.

“Moving towards reduction and in some cases replacement of animal models demands both biological fidelity and throughput,” noted Dr. Lorna Ewart, Emulate Chief Scientific Officer. “AVA meets those dual requirements, empowering teams to rank-order lead candidates, pinpoint off-target toxicities, and advance safer therapies with unprecedented speed and confidence.”

Broad impact across industries

In biopharma, this type of reduction and replacement is already a reality. A leading pharmaceutical company has demonstrated the power of implementing organ-chips into their development pipeline when one of their scientists saved millions of dollars and years of development time by using Emulate Liver-Chips ahead of non-human primates to screen lipid-nanoparticle (LNP) candidates.

AVA’s leap in throughput of predictive human biology stands to benefit not only biopharma but a wide spectrum of sectors that currently rely on inaccurate animal testing. Large pharmaceutical pipelines can now run comparable screens in a single AVA experiment, while smaller biotech teams gain enterprise-level capacity without adding headcount or infrastructure.

Beyond therapeutics, contract research organizations, consumer-product companies, and environmental agencies can harness AVA to evaluate industrial chemicals, food additives, and cosmetic ingredients under human-relevant conditions — bringing faster, more ethical safety and efficacy decisions to market-driven and regulatory programs alike.

“AVA gives scientists unprecedented experimental capacity with the biological depth of live human tissue — something no other platform can match,” said Jim Corbett, Chief Executive Officer at Emulate. “By combining Emulate’s proven organ-on-a-chip technology with high-throughput consumables, automated imaging, and streamlined workflows in one benchtop unit, AVA lets teams ask bigger questions earlier and move the right drug candidates forward faster.”

Accelerate animal-free drug pipelines with organ-on-a-chip technology

Join Emulate's Dr. Lorna Ewart, Chief Scientific Officer and Dr. Daniel Levner, Chief Technology Officer, for an insightful webinar, as they share a preview of the next-generation technology that is purpose built to stay ahead of the animal reduction mandates for toxicology testing.

You will also discover how to align your IND or NDA with the new regulatory landscape, integrate Emulate solutions into existing workflows, and project a quantifiable ROI from faster, more human relevant data.

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