![]() ![]() Experimental preclinical research in animals with human-like hearts has proven it's difficult to engineer and transplant stem-cell derived cardiomyocytes that can beat in tandem with surrounding heart tissue for extended periods of time. ![]() The new insight is a leap forward for engineering stem-cell derived cardiac tissues. Cardiomyocytes cultured next to endothelial cells matured faster compared to cardiomyocytes located farther away from endothelial cells, and they also displayed electrical characteristics typically found in healthy heart tissue. Over the course of seven weeks of monitoring the developing organoids, the team observed that proximity to endothelial cells had a direct impact. When cultured together in a 3D cardiac tissue matrix, cardiomyocytes underwent "extraordinary electrical maturation" in the presence of endothelial cells. Using these techniques in in vitro experiments, the team discovered that the blood vessel lining cells that regulate blood flow between vessels and surrounding tissues (called endothelial cells) play a previously underestimated but crucial role in the rapid and functional maturation of stem-cell derived cardiomyocytes. "We were inspired by the way neural tubes fold during development, stretching as cells migrate and take shape into tissue volume."Īs the cells grew and developed into a small organoid structure, the researchers observed that the sheet easily stretched and accommodated the stem-cell derived tissues as they proliferated and expanded in 3D. "Nature showed us the solution to monitoring tissue in 3D," Liu says. ![]() Liu's team, which specializes in engineering nanoelectronics to bridge the gap between living tissue and electronics, has developed several mesh-like, minimally invasive flexible nanoelectronic sensors designed to be embedded with natural tissues without disturbing normal cellular grown or function. "These mesh-like nanoelectronics, designed to stretch and move with growing tissue, can continuously capture long-term activity within individual stem-cell derived cardiomyocytes of interest," says Jia Liu, co-senior author on the paper, who is an assistant professor of bioengineering at SEAS, where he leads a lab dedicated to bioelectronics. The devices-which are flexible, stretchable, and can seamlessly integrate with living cells to create "cyborgs"-are reported in a Science Advances paper. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) make it possible for the first time to monitor the functional development and maturation of cardiomyocytes-the cells responsible for regulating the heartbeat through synchronized electrical signals-on the single-cell level using tissue-embedded nanoelectronic devices. ![]()
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