Pulsating little human hearts grow in the laboratory of the Viennese biologist Sasha Mendjan. Together with colleagues, he brought stem cells from blood and skin to form a wide variety of heart cells, which develop into a realistic “organoid” with a heart wall and chambers. The researchers have thus discovered a cause of inherited heart defects, simulated the consequences of heart attacks, and they want to find drugs to treat heart diseases. The study was published in the journal “Cell”.
So far, attempts have been made to assemble heart organoids on a prefabricated mini-framework by colonizing it with different heart cells. However, this is only of limited use as a model for research into diseases. “We simply gave the stem cells the right information, and they developed into a small heart with a chamber,” explained Mendjan, who conducts research at the Institute for Molecular Biotechnology (IMBA) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (ÖAW): That is exactly the same thing that happens in human development. Instead of wanting to assemble a heart like an engineer, one hoped for the self-organization of the cells and administered them the necessary natural signaling substances in a certain order at a certain time in a certain combination. “That led to the development of a left ventricle,” he said. This is also the first ventricle that forms in humans in the womb. The heart organoids are made from human stem cells in the blood or skin, which are ethically harmless because they were taken from patients. “So no embryos were harmed in the process,” says Mendjan.
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