PITTSBURGH -- A new research facility in Pittsburgh could make a big difference in the lives of people with a history of heart disease in their family.

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Allegheny General Hospital is opening a new research institute, which focuses on genetic problems and solutions.

The research being done inside the hospital's Gerald McGinnis Cardiovascular Institute's Center for Research and Innovation could eventually change medicine.

Using DNA as a medicine to cure heart disease represents one avenue being explored.

Dr. Raymond Benza, director of the institute, hopes each DNA vial could hold the answer to curing a deadly heart disease known as pulmonary arterial hypertension, which is the result of high blood pressure in someone's lungs.

"People can develop it and not really know that something is wrong with them until it's too late, and once it's diagnosed, the disease rapidly progresses," said Benza.

Most with the disease are only given two years to live.

The team at the institute is looking at how to get good genes, such as ones offspring did not inherit from their parents, to the problem blood vessels.

"We literally have in the freezer a tube of the gene and if we could get it to the blood vessels in our patients' lungs, we believe, and strongly believe, that we could literally cure them" said Dr. Michael Passineau.

Finding a way to deliver those good, corrective genes posses a difficult challenge.

Researchers are growing viruses because they have the ability to get inside of diseased cells and deliver good genes that could cure patients even before a problem arises.

"We see parents, we see children, we see grandparents suffering from the same condition who come and see us in the offices," said Dr. Srinivas Murali.

The facility is also researching many other areas, such as a new heart assist device.

"This would not need a battery at all. This would actually be powered entirely by your own muscle," said senior biomedical engineer Dennis Trumble.