CARLY CASSELLA 23 MAY 2021
Scientists have successfully grown a bundle of human stem cells into a tiny artificial "heart" the size of a sesame seed.
The pulsating mass is the first self-organizing miniature organ to resemble the human heart, including a hollow chamber enclosed by a wall of cardiac-like tissue.
Simple heart-like organs, or cardioids, have been built in the lab before, but only using a scaffold, a mold, or a matrix for the cells to assemble around.
This new cardioid model spontaneously constructed itself. All scientists had to do was coax the pluripotent stem cells in their dish using six signaling pathways known to coordinate heart development in the human embryo.
Other studies have managed to grow self-organizing eye organoids, self-organizing brain organoids, and self-organizing gut organoids using similar signaling techniques.
"It's not that we are using something different than other researchers, but we are just using all of the signals known," explains biologist Sasha Mendjan from the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna.
More:
https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-built-a-self-organizing-mini-human-heart-that-can-pump-liquid-in-and-out
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