Development of a Perfusion Based System for Cardiac Decellularization

Heart failure is one of the leading causes of death worldwide. Currently, heart transplantation is the treatment of choice for end-stage heart failure, but lack of donor hearts and risk of rejection remain a challenge. Research has shown that decellularized hearts, in which cells are removed from the cardiac extracellular matrix (ECM), can provide a scaffold for use in engineering patient-specific heart transplants. This project presents a low-cost, semi-automated, small-organ (ie. rat heart) decellularization bioreactor designed for cardiac research, Testing has shown that this device can successfully decellularize rat hearts, and offers functionality similar to commercial devices