Biology: Heart and Blood Vessels Essay

I watched a video about the biotechnology and bioengineering to help enhance and increase ones rate of living longer or surviving. The Video, called Can We Live Forever, started off with an introduction how the car from the Guinness Book of World Records has been able to sustain a very long lifetime. Irvin Gorman, the owner of the car, has had it for approximately four decades, and the car has been running for more than 2.7 million miles. Every living thing is suppose to eventually break down and die. This is very similar with cars, except Gorman was able to outlast this assumption. Whenever there is a problem with the car, Gorman’s “A” Team goes and fixes it. This is not any different from a living organism, because your body will replace cells constantly just like Gorman’s car’s parts have to be replaced and fixed. Now custom made personalized body parts have soon become a reality. This means that there will no longer be rejections nor waiting lists because of the new bioengineering they have created. For years, transplant surgeons have tried forming cells into organs, but the cells will just end up sitting in clumps. Now, thirty years ago, transplant surgeons discovered that to make an organ, the cells will need a framework to function correctly. They began to use bio rubber as a scaffold, or material, so that the living tissue can grow on. They grew an ear on a mouse so that the organ will already have the blood vessels along with the skin; so that when it is put on a human, there will be no rejection from the body. They did this by incubating and growing perfect cartilage that was already connected to the blood vessels, just like a human’s ear. They will be using these ears on war veterans. They have also been able to create a pair of lungs that function perfectly. If the scientists wish to build more complex organs, like a heart or liver, the scaffold builders need to overcome the problem of having a blood vessel per cell. Since the heart works all day, every day, then there will have to be more blood vessels which are very intricate and hard to make. The blood vessels are like braches from a tree. Except the challenge is for them to not build the big limbs, but instead the tiny twigs and branches that come off of it. Scientists have discovered though that once you wash the cells away, what are left are these proteins. These proteins are what form the framework of the intricate organs. By using a certain chemical, they were able to strip away the cells away, leaving just the proteins and framework of the organ. After injecting dye, they were able to see that the scaffold was undamaged, but yet they were still able to determine the blood vessels. This technique also works with many organs. After having the scaffold, they needed more than just putting cells on the framework of them. They learned that they also need to give them an electrical signal and a mechanical blood pressure along with oxygen. After eight days, they were successfully able to make an artificial lab heart. With this same method, they were able to make a working, living lung. After following a group of Japanese men since the 1960’s, they have discovered genetic reasons that have allowed these men to live longer. The foxo gene is the same superintendent that helps worms live longer and outlast the decay of life. This gene is

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