Eisenberg Leonard M, Eisenberg Carol A
Department of Physiology, New York Medical College, Valhalla, NY 10595, USA.
Int J Mol Sci. 2025 Mar 17;26(6):2683. doi: 10.3390/ijms26062683.
Both cardiac and skeletal muscles originate from the mesoderm, although the two tissues develop from distinct primordia within the early embryo. The shared, albeit distinctive muscle phenotype of these two cell types have led many researchers to investigate whether stem cells from adult skeletal muscle have the capacity to generate cells with a contractile, cardiac phenotype. To date, most of those studies have relied on multistep protocols requiring tissue engineering, co-cultures or transplantation experimentation. In this report, we describe a simple, cell culture method for obtaining contractile, cardiogenic aggregates from skeletal muscle-derived stem cells (MDSCs). Combining in vitro conditions used for promoting the differentiation of cardiac progenitor cells and the long-term maintenance of heart tissue fragments, we have been able to convert MDSCs to myocardial cells that aggregate into beating myospheres. These selective and optimized culture conditions continued to support a contractile cardiogenic phenotype for over four months in vitro. This culture protocol provides a model for future insights into the pathways responsible for the divergence of skeletal and cardiac phenotypes, as well as a source of easily obtained myocardial tissue for subsequent scientific investigations into cardiac function and biology.
心肌和骨骼肌均起源于中胚层，尽管这两种组织在早期胚胎中由不同的原基发育而来。这两种细胞类型共有的肌肉表型（尽管有所不同）促使许多研究人员探究成年骨骼肌干细胞是否有能力生成具有收缩性的心肌表型细胞。迄今为止，大多数此类研究都依赖于需要组织工程、共培养或移植实验的多步骤方案。在本报告中，我们描述了一种简单的细胞培养方法，用于从骨骼肌衍生干细胞（MDSCs）中获得具有收缩性的、能形成心脏组织的聚集体。结合用于促进心脏祖细胞分化和心脏组织片段长期维持的体外条件，我们已能够将MDSCs转化为聚集形成跳动的肌球的心肌细胞。这些经过选择和优化的培养条件在体外持续支持收缩性心脏表型超过四个月。该培养方案为未来深入了解导致骨骼肌和心肌表型分化的途径提供了一个模型，也为后续关于心脏功能和生物学的科学研究提供了易于获得的心肌组织来源。
