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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."

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  1. Re:Don't stop there by exp(pi*sqrt(163)) · · Score: 4, Insightful

    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.

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    Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.