Transplantation of the Heart

Abstract

FOR a number of years, my laboratory has been studying the problem of transplanting the heart of vertebrate animals. In the animal kingdom many necessary prerequisites exist for carrying out this important, and at first sight impossible, operation. The first stage, 1938—42, was my work on cold blooded animals—frogs and fishes. After a number of experimental variants and the perfection of the operation technique, I succeeded in transplanting to a frog a second heart taken from another animal; I planted the second heart in the same pericardium as the heart of the host. Animals with two hearts showed no differences from control frogs, and experienced biologists invited to examine them were unable to distinguish one from the other. Two-hearted frogs went through the usual nuptial period in spring, and cast their spawn in the ordinary way.