(Article by Jackie Rocheleau originally published by Knowable Magazine)

Infusion of the tiny, sausage-shaped structures helps to rejuvenate tissues deprived of blood. Researchers hope the technique can treat a variety of damaged organs.

James McCully was in the lab extracting tiny structures called mitochondria from cells when researchers on his team rushed in. They’d been operating on a pig heart and couldn’t get it pumping normally again.

McCully studies heart damage prevention at Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School and was keenly interested in mitochondria. These power-producing organelles are particularly important for organs like the heart that have high energy needs. McCully had been wondering whether transplanting healthy mitochondria into injured hearts might

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