Experimental design.

<p>Each heart was isolated and mounted on a Langendorff system. Perfused hearts were stabilized for 20(30 min) followed by reperfusion (120 min). Intermittent post-conditioning algorithms during the initial 3 min of reperfusion alternated 9 cycles (10 sec) of drug infusion to 9 cycles of Krebs' infusion according to protocols illustrated above.