Paper heart valves help scientists study calcifying diseases

An experimental device made from filter paper helping University bioengineers study calcifying diseases. The filter paper structured in way mimics the layering of valves, but in it simulates the proliferation in the same way. valves Paper heart valves can become hardened calcium deposits over time, natural protein and in valves’ extracellular it’s called fibrosis. can happen in many of tissues and it calcific valve disease.

Paper is at the heart of an experimental device developed by Rice University bioengineers to study heart disease. They are using paper-based structures that mimic the layered nature of aortic valves, the tough, flexible tissues that keep blood flowing through the heart in one direction only. The devices allow the engineers to study in detail how calcifying diseases slow or stop hearts from functioning. The work by the Brown School of Engineering team, detailed in Acta Biomaterialia, shows heart valve disease that collagen 1, a natural protein and a component of the valves' fibrous extracellular matrix, appears to have a strong association with calcification when it is found outside its usual domain. Valves hardened by calcium deposits are less flexible and lose their ability to seal the heart's chambers. "When tissues make a lot of excess type 1 collagen, it's called fibrosis," said Rice bioengineer Jane Grande-Allen, who directed the study with Rice graduate student and lead author Madeline Monroe.

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