Capi Oren, Gepstein Lior
Sohnis Family Research Laboratory for the Regeneration of Functional Myocardium, Rappaport Family Institute for Research in the Medical Sciences, Israel.
J Control Release. 2006 Nov 28;116(2):211-8. doi: 10.1016/j.jconrel.2006.06.027. Epub 2006 Jun 29.
Regenerative medicine is a new biomedicine discipline that takes advantage of the recent advancements in the fields of stem cell biology, molecular biology, and tissue engineering to derive tissue substitutes, in an attempt to replace or modify the function of diseased organs. The heart represents an attractive candidate for these emerging technologies since adult cardiac tissue has limited regenerative capacity. Consequentially, myocardial cell replacement therapy has emerged as a novel therapeutic paradigm for restoration of the myocardial electromechanical function. This innovative strategy has been significantly hampered, however, by the paucity of cell sources for human cardiomyocytes. The recent establishment of the human embryonic stem cell (hESC) lines may provide a possible solution for this cell-sourcing problem. These unique pluripotent cell lines can be propagated in the undifferentiated state in culture and coaxed to differentiate into cell derivatives of all three germ layers, including cardiomyocytes. This review will describe the hESC system, their differentiation into cardiomyocytes, and the structural and functional characterization of these cardiac lineage derivatives. The potential applications of this unique differentiating system in several research areas will be discussed with special emphasis on the steps required to fully harness their unique potential in the emerging field of cardiovascular regenerative medicine.
再生医学是一门新兴的生物医学学科，它利用干细胞生物学、分子生物学和组织工程领域的最新进展来获取组织替代物，试图替代或改善患病器官的功能。心脏是这些新兴技术的一个有吸引力的应用对象，因为成体心脏组织的再生能力有限。因此，心肌细胞替代疗法已成为恢复心肌机电功能的一种新型治疗模式。然而，这种创新策略因人类心肌细胞的细胞来源匮乏而受到严重阻碍。人胚胎干细胞（hESC）系的近期建立可能为这个细胞来源问题提供一个解决方案。这些独特的多能细胞系可以在培养中以未分化状态增殖，并被诱导分化为包括心肌细胞在内的所有三个胚层的细胞衍生物。本综述将描述hESC系统、它们向心肌细胞的分化以及这些心脏谱系衍生物的结构和功能特征。将讨论这个独特的分化系统在几个研究领域的潜在应用，特别强调在心血管再生医学新兴领域中充分发挥其独特潜力所需的步骤。
