OSAKA -- In what is reportedly a world's first, a group of Japanese scientists said Wednesday they have developed rat cardiac muscle that can strengthen rats' hearts when transplanted.
The muscle, which was created in sheets, can beat automatically outside the body, and is derived from the heart-muscle cells of newborn rats.
The group, led by Teruo Okano, a professor of regenerative medicine at Tokyo Women's Medical University, and Yoshiki Sawa, a cardiovascular surgeon at Osaka University, successfully cultivated newborn rats' cells to form a sheet of cardiac muscle.