Named for the West African god who sculpts the human form, Obatala Sciences makes tissue engineering models from the building blocks of life: cells. Obatala’s Oba Cell™ platform is the first commercially available system for adipose tissue engineering that can create a human fat-on-a-chip model. Obatala uses such organ-on-a-chip technologies to aid studies of diabetes, obesity, cancer and orthopedic disorders. Harvard University recently selected Obatala to commercialize fat-on-a-chip models, spreading technology for researchers’ use in drug discovery and research. Obatala is the first life sciences firm in New Orleans that is run by a Black woman, and it made history as the first minority female-owned firm to raise over $1 million in institutional funds to grow a biotechnology enterprise in Louisiana.