Friday, December 28, 2007

Printing Your Own Heart Patch?

I'm not sure how I missed this, but I thought it was pretty cool: printing heart cells in a gel so they self-assemble to create beating heart muscle.
A Missouri professor took several types of chicken heart cells and 3D printed them into large sheets with cell-friendly gel. The cells took over from there, sorting themselves into working order. Then they began beating, just as a heart would.
While it's not ready (at all) for clinical application, it seems there might be a use for this technology supplying working heart cells for pharmaceutical testing.

-Wes

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