CSB7: Heart Tissue

Recently, researchers from Columbia have discovered a way of repairing a damaged heart. They discovered that using a tissue-engineering platform allows the heart tissue to go through self-repair. Gordana Vukjak-Novakovic is a professor of Biomedical Engineering at Columbia University’s Fu Foundation School of Engineering and Applied science. He led a research project in which many researchers developed a method of cell therapy that treats myocardial infraction, which is the heart damage that follows a heart attack. They were finally able to use both human repair cells and improve blood flow to the damaged tissue. By using this method, they were able to keep the cells in the damaged area as opposed to the massive cell loss associated with infusion of cells alone.

The Columbia Engineering team then removed the cells of the myocardium, the muscle part of the cell, which left a protein platform. They filled the platform with mesenchymal progenitors, human stem cells that can differentiate into many cell types, then applied the patches to damaged heart tissue. The patches ignited the growth of new blood vessels and proteins which helped the tissue to repair itself.

Now that this method of heart repair has been discovered, when will it be used? Many other questions arise with this new discovery. Dr. Vunjak-Novakovic’s team have many other research projects that further explore this concept. They have begun studying the formation of a cardiac patch by using human stem cells. Not only that, they are also studying the stem cells’ ability to “generate mechanical force and electrical conduction, and how these functions can be modulated by in-vitro culture.” This is a huge leap in medical technology, as this could eventually lead to the cure of cardiovascular disease, one of the most serious health conditions. Dr. Vunjak Novakovic said that “This platform is very adaptable and we believe it could be readily extended to the delivery of other types of human stem cells we are interested in to rebuild the heart muscle and further our research of the mechanisms underlying heart repair.”

Source: "Engineers Patch a Heart: Tissue-Engineering Platform Enables Heart Tissue to Repair Itself." Science Daily. N.p., 7 May 2011. Web. 9 May 2011. .