While broken bones eventually heal and many wounds mend themselves, it was thought that the heart, once broken by heart attack or other trauma, didn't.
That is, until Mark Sussman, a San Diego State University biology professor, and other researchers discovered otherwise.
Sussman's goal is "to regenerate the heart." His research is important for the roughly 5 million Americans who have heart failure.
Clinical trials are supporting his idea to extract stem cells, modify them, inject them into the heart and let them rebuild the areas of the heart that are damaged after a heart attack.
He presented his research during a lecture last week titled Healing Broken Hearts: The Promise, Pitfalls and Potential of Stem Cells.
