A new piece of heart, grown from 200 million cells

A woman in her 50s left an Osaka hospital this week with a patch of lab-grown heart muscle beating on her failing heart. Surgeons at Osaka Keisatsu Hospital spent about an hour laying sheets of heart-muscle cells — grown from induced pluripotent stem cells — onto her heart: the world's first surgery using a commercialized iPS therapy. The treatment, developed by surgeon Yoshiki Sawa with Nobel laureate Shinya Yamanaka, is for patients who have run out of options after heart attacks. In earlier trials, all eight patients felt their symptoms ease. 'Our hope is that this will improve the patient's quality of life,' Sawa said. His team plans 75 more operations by 2033.