MIT Researchers Grow Beating Heart Tissue

Iphtashu Fitz writes "Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology report that they have been able to grow heart tissue the size of a dime from cells harvested from rats. When an electrical impulse is passed through the tissue it twitches like a beating heart. This represents the first time scientists have succeeded in using an electrical current to produce dense heart tissue that beats in a rhythm mimicking that of a live animal's heart. The next step for the researchers is to patch damaged hearts of other rats to see if it can behave like a cardiac bandage. If successful this could eventually lead to treatments for heart attacks and other cardiac diseases that can damage and kill large amounts of heart muscle cells."

Comments

Umm...

[over_exposed]

Last time my flesh got hit with current, I sure as hell twicthed! What's so cool about this?

Re:Umm...

[over_exposed]

Ok, so that was supposed to have [sarcasm] and [/sarcasm] tags around it... woops.

Re:Umm...

[Anonymous Coward]

Nah, you could have used the and tags instead.

What they didn't tell you...

[Anonymous Coward]

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology report that they have been able to grow heart tissue the size of a dime from cells harvested from rats. When an electrical impulse is passed through the tissue it twitches like a beating heart.

Coincidentally, I have also discovered a technique to do the same thing. My methodology, if anybody is interested:

1. Get a rat.
2. Cut its heart out.

Et voila! Heart tissue from a rat. Who'da thunk it?

Um, no

[Apreche]

The next phase is myomer. The fictional "muscles" used in Battletech 'mech construction. They are supposedly strong fibers that expand and contract when you pass current through them, or something to that effect.

Giant robots here we come!

Re:Um, no

[CestusGW]

Yeah, but do you really want to run around in a Mackey? I'd wait until you can get your hands on a Black Knight at the very least.

Cool

[OAB_X]

It certainly has a lot of "wow" factor to it. But it will probably not be ready for humans for several years. When they start doing things like this with human hearts start getting excited. After all, while rats are similar to humans in that they are mammals, its not like you can use rat heart cells in humans, at least, and have it work well.

Re:Cool

[Anonymous Coward]

RAT-MAN!
*duhduhduhduhduh duhduhduhduh*
RAT-MAN!

kapow!
KAZING!
bop!
BAP!

Rat-man!

Re:Cool

[Anonymous Coward]

I cant remember exact number but I think Humans & Rats share something like 98% of the same DNA

Igor, raise the lightning rod!

[Engradius]

ITS ALIVE, its alive!!!!!

Problem

[Anonymous Coward]

If the person needing heart repair has a genetic problem, if the tissue culture comes from him in the first place, what exactly has been fixed?

Rats == Amazing

[Anonymous Coward]

So they can take a bunch of rat neurons and hook them up to a flight simulator and teach it (them?) to fly with success. Now we've got heart parts from rat cells. Awesome. I for one welcome Pinky and the Brain. Ruling, er.

Re:Rats == Amazing

[trongey]

Actually these are just the first two steps toward the ability to build fighter pilot rats completely from scratch.

Researchers these days

[termos]

This represents the first time scientists have succeeded in using an electrical current to produce dense heart tissue that beats in a rhythm mimicking that of a live animal's heart.

They are calling themself researchers but they never watched that frankenstein documentary?

Aid for Republicans?

[justanyone]

Hey! There may yet be medical help for the Republican party... They've been heartless for years. But now, through the miracle of Modern Science(tm), we might see the 'compassionate conservatism' (a.k.a. throw-the-beggars-a-'resume-hotline'-business-card )(and fsck the welfare check for the starving widows and orphans).

Yah, flamebait. But, my bleeding-heart-liberal-wife made me post it. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Re:Aid for Republicans?

[superpulpsicle]

This is another article talking about technology that will probably never see daylight cause the government wouldn't know what view to take.

Re:Aid for Republicans?

[DigiShaman]

You're a member of the ACLU according to your website. That right there says it all.

Wake me up when we can grow brain tissue for liberals. Remember, it's better to think logically then emotionally.

Ya, this is flamebait too. But I love playing this game.

Re:Aid for Republicans?

[geekoid]

"Remember, it's better to think logically then emotionally."
I disagree.
I can think of a hell of a lot of eamples where acting emotionally, or having emotions influence your decsion is a good thing.

Don't stop there

[Profane MuthaFucka]

I want a better heart, even though the one I have works just fine. Someday Olympic athletes will have to have their hearts certified as their own, that no doctor has altered it to gain an edge in sports.

Re:Don't stop there

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

No, some day they'll dump the stupid concept that you should be unaltered to enter the Olympics. When that happens the Olympics will become truly spectacular as competitors use training and a mixture of electronic, chemical and biological enhancement to perform feats that are currently undreamt of by athletes. Athletes who refuse to modify themselves will be seen as a curiously old-fashioned bunch of old fuddy duddies.

Re:Don't stop there

[tsa]

I want a better heart because mine doesn't work very well. So I hope to live to see the day this becomes reality. I wonder how much more difficult it is to make a whole heart using this tissue instead of just patches.

Re:Don't stop there

[apiccirilli]

Athletes who refuse to modify themselves will be seen as a curiously old-fashioned bunch of old fuddy duddies.

You say that as if all the countries entering the Olympics have the money to offer that to their athletes...why do we even let all the countries participate anyway? If we want to allow all of this, we might as well kick a whole bunch of them out. Phew, you're right...that is a stupid concept.

Re:Don't stop there

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

Maybe we should shut down Hollywood to give companies with less money more chances of getting an Oscar. Or maybe not.

Maby..

[T-Ranger]

If they diddnt kill one rat to patch the heart of another, they would have the same number of rats, while saving a hell of a lot of effort.

Re:Maby..

[dave1g]

I hope you aren't serious. I would kill a million rats to get me a new heart if I needed one.

amazing result!

[Anonymous Coward]

I didn't know people could become larger simply by beating on tissues.

But why only MIT Researchers? If I were to beat on some heart tissue, would I grow as well?

Wait.. is this what dad meant when he said not to "beat my meat"? Could it be that there is in fact a benefit? What others types of meat besides heart tissue should be beaten?

Fascinating!

Rush Limbaugh is right!

[DigiShaman]

He was not kidding when he said Liberals can not admit who they really are. Hell, just looking at your website tells all.

You sir, have no honor to be posting this on behalf your wife. She should be posting this herself.

This just in.....

[Anonymous Coward]

Scientists repeated this experiment with chicken heart tissue. Now we can't contact anyone in Cincinnati.

(apologies to Bill Cosby)

Immune system

[Nicolay77]

It's not that humans and rat's have a similar brain, or similar hands or only that they are mammals.

They are a lot of other mammals far less useful than rats. That's because rats and humans have a similar immnune system, one that has to resist to several kinds of infections.

And transplant related issues are very much immune system issues, because when a transplant fails, it's often because the immnune system rejects it.

That's the reason they use rats for this and chimps for brain related stuff. Being just a mammal is not useful enough.