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Rotary blood pumps increasingly are being used in open heart surgery and in assisted circulation for patients with heart disease. These rotary devices include vortex (centrifugal) and axial pumps, which can be utilized in conditions where the use of conventional pulsatile pumps would entail problems of cost and size. Rapid progress is now being made in developing new devices for controlling blood flow within the heart and great vessels as well as extracorporeally for use in coronary and intensive care units and, in the future, for long-term use. This book provides information on the physiology of nonpulsatile circulation, the development of rotary pump engineering, and the clinical application of rotary blood pumps. It also presents an overview of future developments in this important field.

The cardiovascular system transports oxygen and nutrients to all parts of the body; therefore, any impediment to this system through, for example, a circulatory disorder, represents a serious threat to organs, tissues, and cells. Obstructive diseases of vessels with a diameter of more than 1 mm can be treated by conventional surgical and interventional approaches; however, blockages in small vessels with a diameter of less than 1 mm cannot be treated by conventional methods. As a consequence, therapeutic ang- genesis and vasculogenesis for the treatment of ischemic diseases have been widely studied in the last decade. These methods may contribute to the re­ pair of intractable cardiovascular diseases with a main vascular involvement in the body's smallest vessels. In this book, Hikaru Matsuda and I have tried to summarize recent Japanese developments in the field of cardiovascular regeneration therapies using tissue engineering. The Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare of Japan has been encouraging the National Cardiovascular Center Research Institute to promote cardiovascular regeneration therapies using such ap­ proaches. Therefore, it is with the financial aid and support of research grants, such as that for Cardiovascular Disease (13C-1 and I6C-6), Health and Labor Sciences Research Grants (RHGTEFB-genome-005, RHGTEFB-saisei-003, and CRCD-junkanki-009) and a grant from NEDO of Japan, that significant progress has been possible.