A new website puts living human heart tissue, and its translational power, within a few clicks of Iowa researchers. The Iowa Living Human Heart Research Program (ILHHRP) at the Carver College of Medicine enables cutting-edge research by providing investigators with living human cardiac tissue, improving the rigor and translational relevance of their studies.

Founded and directed by Jennifer Streeter, MD, PhD, assistant professor in Cardiovascular Medicine, ILHHRP coordinates with the University of Iowa Transplant Surgery team and the Iowa Donor Network to obtain explanted hearts and preserve them in specialized buffer so the cardiac tissue can remain viable for up to eight days under controlled conditions. Investigators are alerted to availability and can request specific tissues, vessels, or cells tailored to their experiments. ILHHRP typically accesses about 1–2 hearts per month—12–24 hearts annually—depending on the frequency of heart transplantations and donations. ILHHRP is one of only six organizations worldwide that provide living cardiovascular tissue for research and currently distributes to 20+ laboratories at the University of Iowa and outside institutions.

A current collaborator with the program, Renata Pereira Alambert, PhD, assistant professor in Endocrinology & Metabolism, was recently awarded a grant from the Roy J. Carver Charitable Trust for a project using ILHHRP-provided epicardial adipose tissue. She will use the tissue to examine how cardiac fat responds to ischemic stress and shapes cardiovascular risk. By comparing transcriptional changes in human and mouse tissues, her team aims to pinpoint molecular drivers of disease and factors that confer protection. [More on Pereria’s grant coming soon!]

“Having access to properly preserved living tissue helps ensure that the molecular and metabolic characteristics are maintained as close as possible to their original state in the body to get more rigorous and cleaner data that closely resembles what happens in physiology,” Pereira said. “It’s already a major step up from using tissues that were not properly preserved or collected in a controlled manner, reducing variability from sample to sample.”

There are caveats, however.

“It’s not perfect because the donor history can add variability and once tissue is outside the body it lacks systemic signals, and the window of viability is finite,” Pereira said, “but it still offers human physiology that can’t be replicated in animals or cultured cells.”

While other research models, such as frozen tissue, cultured cells, and animal models remain valuable, living human heart models provide a uniquely translatable platform relevant to cardiology, metabolism, and other Internal Medicine disciplines.

The new ILHHRP website streamlines requests for human cardiovascular tissue, letters of support for grant proposals, and ongoing projects across the University of Iowa and partnering institutions. For inquiries, tissue requests, or letters of support, contact the ILHHRP team.

[READ MORE: How Streeter and her lab are also using ILHHRP-acquired tissue in her research]