Living skeletal muscle that not only functions like the real thing but can heal itself has been engineered by scientists.
The lab-grown tissue, produced from immature pre-cursor cells, was demonstrated in mice.
Scientists believe it marks a significant step towards growing viable replacement muscle in humans.
Unlike previous examples of bioengineered muscle, the artificially-constructed muscle fibres contracted as strongly as their natural counterparts.
Satellite cells - dormant step cells that can be activated by injury to regenerate damaged tissue - were at the heart of the self-repair mechanism.
The secret was supplying them with the right environment, the researchers writing in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences said.
"Simply implanting satellite cells or less-developed muscle doesn't work as well," said Mark Juhas, a member of the team from Duke University in Durham, US.
"The well-developed muscle we made provides niches for satellite cells to live in, and, when needed, to restore the robust musculature and its function."
Stimulating the tissue with electric pulses to make it contract showed that the engineered muscle was more than 10 times stronger than any of its predecessors.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article