Heart!

September 26th, 2020| Topic: RaMbLeS | 0

Researchers from Michigan State University have done something unique. As reported in “Generation of Heart Organoids Modeling Early Human Cardiac Development Under Defined Conditions,” appearing in bioRχiv, they describe the creation, for the first time, of a miniature human heart model in the laboratory. It has all the different heart cells, a functioning set of chambers, and blood vessels supplying its own needs!

With heart disease the No. 1 cause of death in the US (about 750,000 a year) and in the world (about 7 million a year), this is promising news.

Said Prof. Aguirre, senior author on the study, professor of biomedical engineering at MSU’s Institute for Quantitative Health Science and Engineering:

These minihearts constitute incredibly powerful models in which to study all kinds of cardiac disorders with a degree of precision unseen before.”

The scientists employed stem cells from an adult to generate these human heart organoids.

Explained Yonatan Israeli, a graduate student in the Aguirre Lab and first author of the study:

Organoids—meaning ‘resembling an organ’—are self-assembling 3-D cell constructs that recapitulate organ properties and structure to a significant extent.”

Because these organoids followed the natural cardiac development process, the researchers could study in real time the growth of an actual human heart. Thus far they had access only to donated fetal remains and cells grown in the laboratories, not whole developing hearts.

Aguirre:

Now we can have the best of both worlds, a precise human model to study these diseases—a tiny human heart—without using fetal material or violating ethical principles. This constitutes a great step forward.”

Easily scalable and relatively easy, this is, indeed, a fascinating development in medicine.

Aguirre continued:

This process allows the stem cells to develop, basically as they would in an embryo, into the various cell types and structures present in the heart.”

And what’s next?

In the lab, we are currently using heart organoids to model congenital heart disease—the most common birth defect in humans affecting nearly 1% of the newborn population. With our heart organoids, we can study the origin of congenital heart disease and find ways to stop it.”

Exciting!

But on another level, the “heart problem” is far more pervasive.

The heart is more deceitful than all else
And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?
Jeremiah 17:9

Jesus said:

“For from within, out of the heart of men,
proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries,
deeds of coveting and wickedness,
as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness.
All these evil things proceed from within and defile the person.”
Mark 7:21–23

And, way back when, God agreed with Aguirre et al., preempting the latter: Yup, we need new hearts.

“Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you;
and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.
I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes,
and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.”
Ezekiel 36:26–27

No doubt, this prophetic passage talks of a future day, but the process has already begun (to be consummated in another life, away from the very presence of sin).

Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature;
the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.
2 Corinthians 5:17

For the believer in Christ, this is an already-but-not-yet reality, for they are possessors of new hearts!

My heart will shout with joy in Your deliverance.
Psalm 13:6

SOURCES:
MedicalXpress; bioxriv.org