A " Green " Beating Heart !

One of the leading causes of the death of human beings is a malfunction of the heart.   Put simply, a " heart attack " in one of many forms is the end we fear because it can arrive without warning and we usually only survive if we are lucky enough to get immediate medical attention from someone with life saving skills.

Over recent decades the ability of the medical profession to repair a diseased heart has become legendary.  People who have undergone a quadruple by-pass to graft new veins to carry the blood supply through this organ are out and about in a matter of days and go on to live many years of productive life.  Sadly, for some the damage done is too extreme and the only option is a heart transplant, and that relies entirely on a donor heart becoming available.

We all probably know someone who has lived within reach of a mobile phone, awaiting that call that a heart with the required match tendencies has become donated and now time is the factor. The heart and its new owner need to come together on an operating table within a very short time span and that often requires the intervention of police under lights and sirens to bring them together.

Those on a waiting list despair that every day a huge number of hearts that could save lives go up the chimney at crematoriums or into the earth in burials because so many people have a revulsion against what they see as an invasion of the bodies of their loved ones.  It is the truly courageous who overcome their grief, often acting on the known wishes of the departed.

We have come a long way in the search for a heart replacement.   There have been a number of mechanical devices that have kept people alive for a while, but the need for battery replacement and control function have brought limitations.  The discovery of 3D printing of tissue seemed a likely innovation, but one of the problems was getting a blood flow to all the cells.  The human heart is an inordinately complex organ and to completely replicate it has so far been beyond us.

Now a breakthrough is getting the science people excited.   Two biomedical engineers were having a cordial lunch when their conversation dwelt on this problem of getting a blood flow in materials suitable for inclusion in an artificial heart.   By sheer chance, one of the items on their plates - was spinach, and this green vegetable has some unusual properties.

Spinach leaves tend to replicate the human body.  They have a network of veins, as are present in the human body.  These researchers from the Massachusetts  Polytechnic Institute found that they could remove the cells, leaving behind cellulose, a plant material known to be compatible with mammal tissue.  Cardiac muscle cells were added - and after five days it began to develop a beat, pushing dye through the spinach veins.

It is indeed early days, but the humble spinach has a lot of people thinking of ways to create a new material that may make a created heart possible, probably in conjunction with 3D printing and a host of other innovations.

And according to the comic books, it was spinach that gave Popeye his amazing strength.  Amazing how legend comes full circle !