Long-term artificial heart developed by Daniel Timms and his team at BiVACOR

The Victor Chang Foundation would like to congratulate Australian engineer, Daniel Timms, and his team from his company, BiVACOR, on securing AUD$50 million from the Australian government in order to continue development of the world’s first long-term artificial heart. It is expected to be tested in USA then Australia as early as 2025. One person dies from heart failure every three hours in Australia –but there are only thousands of heart transplants available worldwide. The titanium device weighs about 600 grams, but doesn’t look like any heart found in a human… it is smaller than other artificial hearts tried before – it can fit inside the chest of a child – and for the first time, it’s both long-lasting and responsive. Dr Chang was working on his fifth prototype of an artificial heart just before he died in 1991.