(ORDO NEWS) — Scientists from Harvard and Emory Universities were able to grow a real biohybrid “fish” in the tissues of the human heart.
This achievement will help grow an artificial heart
The biohybrid fish can swim by contracting to the rhythm of the heart. Scientists were able to make contractions automatic.
So the fish will be able to “live” for more than 100 days. It floats in a solution of salt and glucose. Scientists hope that this will give them the opportunity to study heart disease in more depth, as well as grow an artificial analogue.
Our ultimate goal is to build an artificial heart to replace the hearts of children who were born with congenital heart defects, says Kevin Keith Parker, a bioengineer at Harvard University.
The biohybrid fish has two layers of cardiomyocytes on each side of the tail fin. When one side is strongly compressed, the other side is stretched, triggering a feedback mechanism that causes the stretched side to contract and then triggers the same mechanism on the other side in an ongoing cycle.
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