From rat cells can create a jellyfish

Harvard scientists have cells of rat hearts, put them on a silicone substrate was placed in the solution and stimulated with an electric current. And it floated.

"From the point of view of morphology is a jellyfish, - says the project manager Keith Parker. - In terms of features - also the jellyfish. But it is genetically normal rats. " Behind the jokes are five years: at first they have long studied how the floating jellyfish, just take a cell by cell and watched what was happening to them. It turned out that wave passes jellyfish electrical pulse in exactly the same way as on the heart muscle. Remained little things - grow a monolayer of heart muscle cells on a polymer substrate (polymethylsiloxane, if you're interested and you just think, where to build out of your freshly caught rat Rat-traps). Most interesting, according to scientists, - to see how the underside of the funnel formed lzhemeduzy fluid flow, a hair's breadth as one that carries food to the mouth of this jellyfish. This means that Medusa has turned out a success.

What are the plans for this group of scientific researchers? First, they say, is now a good idea to make an octopus. This is what pushes them to the internal logic of the study. But on the other hand, the requirements of practice (and from scientists always require practical application of their research) lead them to postpone the octopus and jellyfish do again, but from the person. That is, cells of the human heart. And then testing it on a variety of medications.



via factroom.ru