Grant: Operating Grant

Beating heart cells, cardiomyocytes, cannot regenerate on their own. Thus, hearts affected by heart attack or other heart diseases have limited ability to regenerate. Beating heart cells can only be reliably obtained in large numbers from pluripotent stem cells. The problem with this approach is that these cardiomyocytes are immature, they resemble cells found in the hearts before birth. The goal is to make cells similar to those found in adult human hearts, so that we can help patients with heart disease. This process is called maturation. In this proposal we will apply engineering methods, through use of electrical stimulation and mechanical control of the environment in which cells are growing to mature cardiomyocytes derived from human pluripotent stem cells. We will also make small human tissues using the same approach and test its utility in drug screening. We can discover new cardiac drugs or drug side effects using these engineered human heart tissues. Finally, we will use animal experiments to determine the level of cardiomyocyte maturation required to best heal a heart affected by a heart attack.