Medicine’s dream of growing new human hearts and other organs to repair or replace damaged ones received a significant boost on Sunday when University of Minnesota researchers reported success in creating a beating rat heart in a laboratory.

Experts not involved in the Minnesota work called it “a landmark achievement” and “a stunning” advance. But they and the Minnesota researchers cautioned that the dream, if it is ever realized, is still at least 10 years away.

and this was done without embryonic stem cells too.