• Question: how do you get the heart to keep beating when away from the body p.s. it is really cool but disgusting

    Asked by data to Fiona, Audra, Gavin, Justin on 13 Mar 2012. This question was also asked by sammybowden, gaby0612, cherellec.
    • Photo: Fiona Hatch

      Fiona Hatch answered on 13 Mar 2012:

      lol, i know what you mean, sometimes I find it difficult to work with and I have a strong stomach!

      So while the heart is inside the rat (as with other organs) it needs nutrients. These include stuff like glucose (sugar), oxygen and minerals (like calcium, sodium and potassium). All these things are provided to the heart by the blood that is constantly flowing around it and through it and keeping it warm (37C)

      So when I remove the heart I place it in the dish (which I assume you’ve seen the video – hence the disgusting part!) the liquid it is in has all those nutrients.

      I make up the liquid before my experiment. This contains some glucose, some sodium acetate (which gives it the sodium), some phosphate (which gives it the potassium) and some calcium chloride (which gives it the calcium). I then heat this liquid up to 37C before it gets poured onto the heart. The last ingredient is the oxygen, which is in a large cylinder next to my equipment and I have a tube which I can place in the dish and this pumps oxygen through the liquid.

      With all those nutrients the heart can continue to beat. Some scientists in Japan have been able to keep the heart beating like that for 2 days!

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