To find cures for human diseases, we need reliable models of human tissue that can be used to dynamically monitor disease progression and test drugs with reasonable throughput. However, existing model systems, such as rodents and conventional cell culture platforms, fall short in recapitulating critical features of native human tissues, which limits their relevance. To address this need, the Laboratory for Living Systems Engineering fabricates micro-scale mimics of native human tissues that provide meaningful physiological outputs with scalability and reproducibility. We focus primarily on cardiac and skeletal muscle.