• Posted November 10, 2025

Scientists Create Foldable Stem Cell Patch to Heal Heart Damage

A Mayo Clinic team has developed a new way to repair damaged hearts without open-heart surgery, and early results suggest it could one day help people with severe heart failure.

The team created a thin patch of lab-grown heart tissue using reprogrammed adult stem cells. The patch can be folded and placed on the heart through a small incision, instead of opening the chest. 

In preclinical tests, the patch helped the heart pump better and reduced scarring, researchers said.

"For patients with severe heart failure, there are very few options beyond mechanical pumps or transplants. We hope this approach will offer a new way to repair their own hearts," senior study author Dr. Wuqiang Zhu in a news release. He’s a cardiovascular researcher at Mayo Clinic in Phoenix. 

Researchers recently published their findings in the journal Acta Biomaterialia.

Heart attack damage normally can’t be reversed, because the heart cannot regrow healthy muscle on its own. 

Zhu’s team reprograms ordinary adult cells such as blood or skin into induced pluripotent stem cells, enabling them to create new heart muscle and blood vessel cells.

They then layer those cells onto a paper-thin patch made of tiny fibers. The patch is then loaded into a small tube and guided to the heart, where it unfolds on its own and is held in place with a medical adhesive instead of stitches.

In tests of preclinical models, the patch:

• Improved heart function

• Reduced scar tissue

• Increased vascular growth

• Lowered inflammation

"Our results show that these engineered tissues not only survive but actually help the heart heal itself," Zhu said. "That's the ultimate goal: to replace what's lost and restore function."

The team hopes the treatment could one day help patients who are too sick for open-heart surgery or who are waiting for a transplant. 

"Our vision," Zhu added, "is that patients could one day receive engineered heart tissue made from their own reprogrammed cells, delivered through a minimally invasive procedure — no donor organ, no long recovery, just a repaired heart."

Human trials are still some years away, Zhu noted.

"Heart failure remains a devastating condition," he said. "If we can make stem cell treatment accessible to more patients, especially those too fragile for open-heart surgery, we could save lives." 

More information

The Mayo Clinic has more on heart failure.

SOURCE: Mayo Clinic, news release, Nov. 5, 2025