Bad Heart? Grow a New One

There are not a lot of things that a zebra fish can do that a human can't. Both species can swim, eat and stare blankly in to space. One area that the two inch long fish has an advantage on us is that it can regrow its heart once it's been cut out. But that could soon change. Scientists at Duke University have discovered the unique mechanism that allows the zebra fish to regenerate heart tissue, and are postulating that they might be able to transfer that ability to humans.

Scientific American reports:

Like zebra fish, mammal hearts have progenitor cells and an epicardium, but the former's "found a way to regenerate effectively," Poss says. The regenerative mechanism discovered in this fish could "give people who are eager to repair human hearts a pathway to hone in on," says Deborah Yelon, a researcher at New York University who studies zebra fish but was not involved in the study. The current findings suggest strategies that can be tested in human hearts, such as introducing growth factors and activating the receptors on epicardial cells, she says. "Maybe we can get mammalian progenitor cells to behave more like zebra fish cells," she adds.