ISRAELI SCIENTISTS 'PRINT' WORLD'S FIRST 3D HEART WITH HUMAN TISSUE
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
ISRAELI SCIENTISTS 'PRINT' WORLD'S FIRST 3D HEART WITH HUMAN TISSUE
A team of Tel Aviv University researchers revealed the heart, which was made using a patient’s own cells and biological materials.
A team of Israeli researchers has “printed” the world’s first 3-D vascularized, engineered heart.
On Monday, a team of Tel Aviv University researchers revealed the heart, which was made using a patient’s own cells and biological material. Until now, scientists have successfully printed only simple tissues without blood vessels.
“This is the first time anyone anywhere has successfully engineered and printed an entire heart replete with cells, blood vessels, ventricles and chambers,” said Prof. Tal Dvir of TAU’s School of Molecular Cell Biology and Biotechnology, Department of Materials Science and Engineering in the Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, and the Sagol Center for Regenerative Biotechnology, who was the lead researcher for the study.
He worked with Prof. Assaf Shapira of TAU’s Faculty of Life Sciences, and Nadav Moor, a doctoral student. Their research was published in Advanced Science.
Heart disease is the leading cause of death among both men and women in the United States. In Israel, it is the second largest cause of death (after cancer). In 2013, heart disease accounted for about 16% of the total number of deaths in Israel, according to the Health Ministry.
Heart transplantation is often the only treatment available to patients with end-stage heart failure. The waiting list for patients in the US can be as much as six months or more. In Israel and the US, many patients die while on the waiting list, hoping for a chance at survival.
“This heart is made from human cells and patient-specific biological materials. In our process, these materials serve as the bioinks, substances made of sugars and proteins that can be used for 3-D printing of complex tissue models,” Dvir explained.
“People have managed to 3D-print the structure of a heart in the past, but not with cells or with blood vessels. Our results demonstrate the potential of our approach for engineering personalized tissue and organ replacement in the future,” he said.
At this stage, the 3-D heart produced at TAU is sized for a rabbit, but the professors said that larger human hearts could be produced using the same technology.
For the research, a biopsy of fatty tissue was taken from patients, according to a release. The cellular and a-cellular materials of the tissue were then separated. The cells were reprogrammed to become pluripotent stem cells that could then be efficiently differentiated into cardiac or endothelial cells. The extracellular matrix (ECM), a three-dimensional network of extracellular macromolecules, such as collagen and glycoproteins, was processed into a personalized hydrogel that served as the printing “ink.” The differentiated cells were then mixed with the bio-inks and were used to 3D-print patient-specific, immune-compatible cardiac patches with blood vessels and, subsequently, an entire heart.
According to Dvir, the use of “native” patient-specific materials is crucial to successfully engineering tissues and organs.
The next step, they said, is to teach the hearts to behave like human hearts. First, they will transplant them into animals and eventually into humans. The hope is that within “10 years, there will be organ printers in the finest hospitals around the world, and these procedures will be conducted routinely,” Dvir said.
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Even though their lunar module crashed while landing on the moon, the Israelis have brought some amazing benefits to the world.
Yep, I should have known it. An IDF soldier can shoot a Hamas operative in the leg when he climbs the border fence and throws a grenade at the soldier, and the mainstream media will have headlines across the country, like: "Israel shoots to kill Gazans", but when something as amazing as this WORKING artificial heart is 3D printed by an Israeli medical scientist, you won't even find the story anywhere in the world but Israel.
Buzz does this surprise you?
Of course not. Anti-Israel media bias is rampant world wide.
It is nice that we give Israel plenty of cash and weapons to defend themselves as well.
Isn't that what conservatives say about other countries?
Have more of their own cash to develop such things.
Of course I am trying to sound as cynical as some.
Now only if it would be available for the poor.
Yes, isn't it nice, Ender, when you actually THINK about all the benefits that flow back to the USA. I'm really getting tired of having to post over and over and over again what they are, so maybe you could do a little googling of Israeli benefits to the USA since I've probably posted it about 5 times already.
Is it "all about the Benjamins" Ender? Have you any idea about the expert teams that Israel sends out to wherever in the world there is a natural disaster. Israeli expert teams were sent to Haiti where they set up and manned a whole hospital. They went to California to help people suffering stress from the wildfires. The went to where there was flooding recently in the USA. They went to Mexico to help rescue people from the earthquake. They are often the first ones wherever there is a disaster. They offered help to Iran from their water problem, and were turned down by the Iranian fools. The do heart operations on Arab children, the Syrians and the Palestinians.
AND THEY DO IT FOR FREE, ENDER, FOR FREE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Wow, that's some very impressive science, but I'm not s sure that's a good direction for science to be going in.
I'm not trying to downplay it, it is remarkable and amazing and I hope they use it to grow replacements for damaged organs or birth defects. Maybe this could be a cure for diabetes.
but there are a couple of other directions I'd have wished they'd have accomplished a breakthrough, for instance a medication that stops brain deterioration (what good is it to live longer after a couple of hard strokes or a aneurism) or a cancer treatment that doesn't kill cells seemly based on their metabolism.
Make life BETTER, not just longer.
I agree with Ender, this is a long procedure that only the very elite will have access to (even if it was cheap) for the sole purpose for them to extend their own life span. People in power want stay in power not for decades but for generations.
You should do a little reading to educate yourself on some of the medical achievements in Israel:
Preventing strokes without excessive bleeding. Biotech eXithera is a portfolio company of Israel’s Clal Biotechnology. It has developed an anti-coagulant which has successfully completed Phase 1 trials. The treatment delays coagulation rather than prevents it and its effects cease quickly when the treatment stops.
European funds for depression therapy. (TY Atid-EDI ) I reported previously (see here) on the brain analysis system developed by Israel’s elminda. The EU has just awarded elminda a 2-year grant through its Horizon 2020’s phase 2 program. It will help elminda develop and trial its BNA-PREDICT product for depression.
Same microbe different effect. Scientists at Israel’s Weizmann Institute have developed algorithms that can identify structural variants in the genomes of human gut microbiomes. People with a certain variant were much thinner than those who had the same microbe but not the variant. The variants can also pinpoint disease factors.
Technion printer for human tissues. (TY Nevet ) Israel’s Technion Institute has set up a 3D center for the printing of cells, tissues and organs. Its purpose is to enable Technion researchers to develop tissues containing blood vessels or 3D scaffolds that quickly connect to the patient’s own blood vessels.
Bio-inspired robots. (TY WIN & i24 News) Researchers at Israel’s Ben Gurion University have created tiny robots that could soon become part of medical procedures.
Rare pediatric double organ transplant. 13-year-old Hila Amram received a new liver and pancreas at Petah Tikva’s Schneider Children’s Medical Center. The double transplant saved her life and freed her from insulin dependence. The op was even more complex due to the donor’s internal organs being reversed – a rare anomaly.
Israeli bio-techs merge. I reported previously (see here) on Jerusalem-based immunotherapy company Enlivex Therapeutics. Enlivex has merged with Tel Aviv-headquartered Bioblast (see here) , which is developing treatments for rare genetic diseases.
Snow on Mt Hermon – good news for cancer patients. During the winter, Israeli charity Ezer Mizion often takes oncology clinic kids on a trip to Mt. Hermon. And if their blood count results are anything to go by, the benefits to the children last long after they return from the “sledging, tobogganing and fun, fun, fun!”
And that's only a part of it....
True, I hadn't heard about any of those. (pause) which makes me wonder, why not? science advances like that are very newsworthy in my opinion. I'll have to look for a online medical journal that covers world-wide discoveries which be sort of a antidote for articles about new ways and weapons to kill more people faster.
Meantime, GOOOOO MEDICAL RESEARCH!!!
Yeah!!!