Slightly reminiscent of Howard Stern’s radio cadaverathon, which called on people to donate spare cadavers when Yale and Harvard med schools ran out of bodies, Wayne State University is now asking Michigan hunters to donate wild turkey hearts for research.
A call for action from the Detroit Free Press:
The National Wild Turkey Federation recently joined the school in making the appeal. Researchers hope that tests using wild turkey hearts could lead to medical breakthroughs for combating heart problems in humans.
“There is a mutation in the heart of a wild turkey that lowers the incidence of heart disease and congestive heart failure,” Tim Kwiecien, a Wayne State premedical student, said in a released statement. “By donating the hearts of harvested wild turkeys for our research, turkey hunters can help us make strides.”
Professor Jian-Ping Jin, chairman of the Department of Physiology at Wayne State’s School of Medicine, is working with Kwiecien. They plan to further analyze the heart mutation this summer.
More from Free Press: Wayne State asking for hunters’ turkey hearts…
Image credit: Noma’s American Water Spaniels
(Hat tip: Dr. Wes)