[Science World] Is It Possible to Develop a Perfect 'Artificial Heart'?

The human heart circulates 200 million liters of blood throughout the body over a lifetime (about 75 years). To achieve this, it beats 3 billion times in a lifetime, more than 40 million times a year, without stopping. No malfunction is tolerated during this time, and even a slight abnormality can cause the entire body's functions to cease immediately. This is why most people would undoubtedly name the ‘heart’ as the most important organ in the human body.

The problem is that not everyone's heart is healthy enough to endure a lifetime. In every country, heart disease is one of the leading causes of death. In severe heart conditions, ‘heart transplantation’ is considered, and if successful, a complete cure can be expected. However, there are not enough brain-dead donors to provide hearts, and if the transplanted heart is not immunologically compatible, the patient suffers from severe rejection reactions. Practically, the 5-year survival rate is about 50%. In other words, to completely overcome severe heart disease, humanity must develop a device that perfectly replaces the function of the human heart, the so-called ‘artificial heart.’ But is such a thing really possible?

Attempts to create artificial hearts have existed since the past. The first artificial hearts were ‘mechanical,’ designed to replace the heart’s function with pump devices and the like. In 1969, an artificial heart called the ‘Jarvik-7’ was developed. This artificial heart was actually implanted into a human body in 1982, 13 years after its development. However, the recipient patient died after 112 days due to pneumonia, emphysema, and seizures. While it was a technological advancement as a first attempt, it was clearly a failed surgery from the patient’s perspective. Since then, mechanical artificial heart technology has gradually advanced, and various types have been developed and used. The average survival period is about one year, with the longest survival record known to be around four years. Its purpose is not a cure but rather a temporary measure to buy time until a heart transplant from a brain-dead donor can be performed. Another problem is that regular reoperations are required to replace batteries. If biocompatible new materials and high-efficiency power management technologies are developed, the usage period is likely to increase in the future.

There is also research on organically creating a replacement for the human heart using life science technology. This is the so-called ‘biological artificial heart.’ There are various ideas, but among them, the ‘xenogeneic organ’ approach has the greatest feasibility and is attracting attention. This involves genetically modifying other animals so that they are born with organs that can be transplanted into humans without side effects. The animal considered for organ donation is the ‘pig.’ Pigs are noted because their organ shapes are similar to humans’, they grow quickly, and desired organs can be easily obtained.

In fact, there have been cases where pig hearts were transplanted into humans. However, the results were not good. In 2022, at the University of Maryland Medical Center, a terminal heart disease patient received the world’s first genetically modified pig heart transplant but died after two months. In 2023, a similar surgery was performed again at the same university, but the patient passed away after six weeks. This indicates that current technology still requires more time, but it is expected that long-term survival cases will emerge within a few years.

The ultimate goal of all scientific technology inevitably becomes medicine because the innate human desire is to live healthily and long. If a durable, high-performance artificial heart that can be used for a lifetime is developed and distributed, the average human lifespan itself will increase by 5 to 10 years or more. To achieve this immediate goal, the efforts of scientists and technologists are expected to continue in the future.

Jeon Seung-min, Science and Technology Specialist Writer