I want a heart in a jar
Jan 20th, 2008 by Axel
A lab at the University of Minnesota has done something cool: they’ve grown a functioning heart from stem cells. The problem with building complex organs in a lab is that their normal construction required an elaborate context in the developing embryo, something that is impossible to replicate, short of just growing the whole embryo. The Doris Taylor lab did something very clever: they took an adult rat or rabbit heart and stripped it of its cells, leaving behind a scaffold of nonliving connective tissue. Then they recellularized it with stem cells, and they differentiated appropriately to make a new, beating heart.
Pharyngula: I want a heart in a jar
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