On Sept. 1, 2016, the University of British Columbia (UBC) announced that researchers at UBC’s Okanagan campus had developed synthetic heart valves, arteries and veins made of polyvinyl alcohol hydrogel, that resembles human tissue.

The polyvinyl ’tissue’ made it possible for surgeons and medical residents to practice bypass surgery techniques using the synthetic material as opposed to the current method of using arteries and veins from dead pigs or human cadavers.