Guinea pig hearts beat with human cells

Damaged skin and liver can often repair themselves, but the heart rarely heals well and heart disease is the world’s leading cause of death. Research published today raises hopes for cell therapies, showing that heart muscle cells differentiated from human embryonic stem cells can integrate into existing heart muscle.

“What we have done is prove that these cells do what working heart muscles do, which is beat in sync with the rest of the heart,” says Chuck Murry, a cardiovascular biologist at the University of Washington in Seattle, who co-led the research.