Cardiomyocytes from stem cells
Researchers from the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease in San Francisco have identified for the first time the factors controlling the process of differentiation of stem cells into cardiomyocytes.
For several decades, scientists have not been able to detect a single factor capable of turning non-specialized stem cells into heart muscle cells. It turned out that a combination of three proteins is necessary for differentiation into cardiomyocytes.
Benoit Bruneau and Jun Takeuchi have shown that the genes responsible for the development of cardiomyocytes are activated by transcription factors (proteins that ensure the transcription of a gene – reading its information on matrix RNA). But in order for these proteins – Tbx5 and Gata4 – to be able to bind to DNA, the participation of a third protein, Baf60c, a chromatin remodeling factor, which unfolds the DNA helix, in an inactive state, wound onto chromatin protein globules, is necessary.
In experiments on mouse cell cultures, mesodermal cells capable of forming bone, blood, skeletal muscle and other tissues, when added to the culture medium of Baf60c, Tbx5 and Gata4 factors, turned only into cardiomyocytes, which rhythmically contracted like normal heart muscle cells.
Heart diseases are the main cause of death in developed countries, and the heart muscle's own ability to recover from damage is clearly insufficient. Therefore, Dr. Bruno, without too much modesty, considers his work to be the first serious step in understanding possible ways to create cells capable of restoring heart muscle damaged as a result of heart attack and other cardiovascular diseases.
The article by Jun K. Takeuchi & Benoit G. Bruneau Directed transdifferentiation of mouse mesoderm to heart tissue by defined factors was published in the electronic version of the journal Nature on April 26, 2009.
Portal "Eternal youth" www.vechnayamolodost.ru based on GICD materials: Gladstone Scientists Identify Key Factors in Heart Cell Creation
28.04.2009