Have a Heart – Make a Difference for Animals Too
Through our revolutionary 3D bioprinting process we will produce viable human organs for transplant and provide a higher quality of life for patients. However, there is another group that we are passionate about helping through the use of our technology – Animals!
You might now know that due to FDA requirements animals are generally the subject of testing for the safety of drugs in order to better understand a product’s impact on humans. But what we are working on could potentially provide a viable alternative.
How? One of our short-term goals is our “mini-heart” which is a 3D bio-printed scaled-down version of a human heart, which we plan to offer as an alternative to using animals for testing in certain cases.
Why? Because the statistics are staggering! Annually, more than 115 million animals are used worldwide in experimentation within the biomedical industry.
But what’s wrong with animal testing?
-There is an ethical argument that animal testing is cruel and unnecessary
– The use of animal testing often gives misleading results and is not always predictive of human health effects
– Animal experimentation often significantly harms humans through misleading safety studies and the potential abandonment of effective therapeutics, while potentially leading researchers in the wrong direction and wasting valuable time and money
– Instances of animal cruelty are prolific and commonplace
Although our “mini-heart” will only be the size of a mouse heart, its benefits can be huge. It will be a functional, beating, pumping heart that we can offer to pharmaceutical companies to use for testing – after all, what could predict the effects a drug can have on a human heart better than an actual (albeit small) human heart?
We know every day counts, and we want to save as many lives as we can – human and animal!
Got heart? Join BIOLIFE4D as we work to better humanity’s future.
