 |
- Home
- Clinical Perspectives
- Business Perspectives
- Patient Care
- CME
- Community
- Products
- Careers
- Contact Us
Pluripotent Stem Cells Model Cardiac Disease Mechanisms Publish date: Jul 22, 2010  THURSDAY, July 22 (HealthDay News) -- Researchers have successfully generated pluripotent stem cells capable of recapitulating
certain aspects of long-QT syndrome type 1, according to an article published online July 21 in the New England Journal
of Medicine. Alessandra Moretti, Ph.D., of the Technical University of Munich in Germany, and colleagues obtained dermal fibroblasts
from two members of a family affected by long-QT syndrome type 1 and two healthy controls, infected the fibroblasts with retroviral
vectors to generate pluripotent stem cells, and then directed the stem cells to differentiate into cardiac myocytes. The researchers found that the stem cells maintained the long-QT syndrome type 1 genotype and generated functional myocytes.
Action potential duration was especially prolonged in ventricular and atrial cells from the long-QT syndrome type 1 patients
compared with cells from the controls. Myocytes derived from the long-QT syndrome type 1 patients had greater susceptibility
to catecholamine-induced tachyarrhythmia; beta-blockade had a protective effect on this phenotype. "We generated patient-specific pluripotent stem cells from members of a family affected by long-QT syndrome type 1 and
induced them to differentiate into functional cardiac myocytes. The patient-derived cells recapitulated the electrophysiological
features of the disorder," the authors write. Copyright © 2010 HealthDay. All rights reserved. | Featured Jobs Practice Tools Coding Counselor Simple and accurate ICD-9 code search. Start Here  Patient Education Print customized patient education handouts. Start Here  Dermatology Diagnosis Identify skin diseases by age, gender, location. Start Here  AHRQ Clinical Guidelines Objective findings on medical interventions. Start Here     |
