Lead Inventor:
Mercy M. Davidson, Ph.D.
Cardiac Research Limited to Few Cell Sources:
Current cardiac research is restricted by very limited cell sources, as human primary cardiomyocytes have a finite life-span in culture before becoming terminally differentiated. Attempts to immortalize ventricular cardiomyocytes in order to establish a proliferating human cardiomyocyte cell line for research have not been successful.
This technology established a ventricular cardiomyocyte cell line from human primary cardiomyocytes by a novel mitochondrial function-based immortalization method. So far this is the only immortalized human cardiomyocyte cell line that can proliferate and differentiate in culture and can express the adult cardiomyocyte phenotype when culture conditions are manipulated.
Immortal Cells for Cardiac Research:
This technology provides a novel technique of immortalizing post-mitotic cells that have exited the cell cycle. The human cardiomyocyte cell line derived by this method, is stably immortalized, and can be frozen and propagated repeatedly over 100 generations.
Available for license with EMD Millipore
This human cardiomyocyte cell line expresses both cardiac and skeletal muscle-specific markers, including contractile proteins such as: b-myosin heavy chain; a-cardiac actin; Troponin I; the muscle-specific intermediate filament protein, desmin; the cardiomyocyte-specific peptide hormone, atrial natriuretic peptide (ANP); and coupled gap junction proteins, connexin-43 and connexin-40. And these cells can be induced to differentiate in culture to express adult skeletal muscle and cardiac muscle phenotypes, which could be evaluated by patch clamp electrophysiology, biochemical tests and molecular genetic analysis.
Available for license with EMD Millipore
Applications:
• This human cardiomyocyte cell line provides a tissue culture model to evaluate pharmacological and physiological effects of drugs in order to devise and test therapeutic strategies
• This human cardiomyocyte cell line can be useful for the evaluation of cell transplantation techniques in regeneration of cardiac muscle and treatment of cardiac muscle diseases
• The immortalized cell lines are potentially useful in vitro models to study developmental regulation of genes and signaling pathways that regulate cardiomyogenesis in normal and pathological states
• The technique of immortalization could be used to immortalize other primary cultures that have exited the cell cycle
Advantages:
• This is the only human proliferating cardiomyocyte cell line available at the present time. The cell line could be an effective and cost efficient tool for both basic scientists and clinicians involved in cardiovascular research.
Patent Status: Patent Issued (US 7,223,599) ~ see link below.
Licensing Status: Available for Licensing and Sponsored Research Support.
Available for license with EMD Millipore
Publications:
Davidson MM, Nesti C, Palenzuela L, Walker WF, Hernandez E, Protas L, Hirano M, Isaac ND. Novel cell lines derived from adult human ventricular cardiomyocytes. (2005) J Mol Cell Cardiol 39(1):133-147.
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