Current Pharmaceutical Design - Volume 20, Issue 12, 2014

Myocardial infarction constitutes an important health-related problem worldwide. Despite current treatments that salvage myocardial tissue and unload the left ventricle, chronic heart failure is common and is associated with increased morbidity and mortality. During the past decade, experimental studies, using cell-based therapies and growth factor administration integrated in biomaterial scaffolds, have demonstrate Read More

Loss of cardiac function following myocardial infarction (MI) remains a leading cause of morbidity in the developed world. Current percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) practice facilitates rapid relief of acute thrombotic occlusion with follow on medical treatment of associated atherosclerotic and thrombotic risks, late ventricular remodeling and cardiac arrhythmias. The application of regenerative therapies aim Read More

S100A6, a 20 kDa, Ca2+ - binding dimer with low basal cardiac expression, is upregulated in the rat heart following infarction and forced expression of S100A6 in rat neonatal cardiac myocyte cultures, inhibited the induction of β myosin heavy chain (MHC), skeletal α actin (skACT) and myocyte apoptosis in response to diverse stimuli including tumor necrosis factor α. To define a role for S100A6 in vivo, we generated cardiac myo Read More

This article reviews the current progresses in application of both exogenous and endogenous progenitor cells/stem cells for cardiac repair, and the current understanding of the naturally-occurring process for physiological myocyte turnover and possibly cardiac repair. In particular the development of methods for potentiating the naturally-occurring mechanism for substantial repair of pathologically damaged cardiac tis Read More

Aim of the presented study was to investigate the role of stromal derived factor 1 (SDF-1α) in mobilizing stem cells in combination with endothelial progenitor cell (EPC) transplantation in a regenerative strategy for myocardial infarction therapy in a murine ischemia/reperfusion model. Initially bone marrow was eradicated and reconstituted with the use of green fluorescent protein (GFP) labelled allogenic cells. After reconstituti Read More

Chemokines are a family of chemotactic cytokines that play an essential role in leukocyte trafficking. Upregulation of both CC and CXC chemokines is a hallmark of the inflammatory and reparative response following myocardial infarction. Release of danger signals from dying cells and damaged extracellular matrix activates innate immune pathways that stimulate chemokine synthesis. Cytokineand chemokine-driven adhesive int Read More

It is reputed that the ideal therapeutic approaches to treatment of patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS) and myocardium infarction (MI) should be aimed at the inflammation reaction triggers. This study investigated the effectiveness of the impact of L- 17 compound of the group of 5- phenyl substituted-6H-1,3,4-thiadiazine-2-amines upon the course of experimental MI as compared to the impact of a preparation, offici Read More

Following myocardial infarction (MI), a dynamic and complex process called wound healing is initiated, aiming to produce a robust scar and limit adverse remodeling of the left ventricle (LV). Cardiac fibroblasts (CFs) - the most populous cardiac cell-type - differentiate into myofibroblasts under the influence of post-MI mechanical stress, transforming growth factor β (TGF-β) and various inflammatory signals. Myofibroblasts are c Read More

In the recent years, the existence of cardiac regeneration in mammalian models and even humans has been confirmed in several, carefully designed and executed studies. However, the intrinsic rate of cardiomyocyte renewal is not sufficient to replenish the large number of cells lost after a major injury in the heart, such as myocardial infarction. Therefore, exogenously administered cells with progenitor properties ha Read More

The generation of functional human cardiomyocytes carries the potential of replacing damaged, malformed, or congenitally absent cardiac tissue as a definitive cure for cardiac disease. Furthermore, patient-specific cardiomyocytes may yield useful in vitro models of heart tissue for disease investigation, drug development and personalized therapy evaluation. This field has experienced rapid advances in the past few years. N Read More

Background: Transplantation of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) alters the ventricular electrophysiologic properties after myocardial infarction (MI) in rats. However, it is unclear whether MSCs transplantation enhances the secretion of nerve growth factor (NGF) and affects cardiac sympathetic remodeling. Methods: MI was induced in 35 male Sprague-Dawley rats. Two weeks later, the animals were randomized to MSCs or phosp Read More

Cell therapy and tissue engineering attract increasing attention as a potential approach for cardiac repair. Although a plethora of interesting concepts in the emerging field of cardiac stem cell-based tissue engineering are reported, there are still challenges that this field needs to overcome to achieve therapeutic translation into the clinical praxis. Engineering biomaterial scaffolds that facilitate stem cell engraftme Read More

Myocardial infarction (MI) and the subsequent heart failure remain among of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality in world wide. A number of studies have demonstrated that intramyocardial biomaterials injections improve cardiac function after implantation because of their angiogenic potential. Thermoresponsive hydrogels, one member of the hydrogels family, are a kind of biomaterial whose structure is similar to that Read More

Cell therapy has been proposed to treat patients with end-stage heart failure. However, it has been suggested that the significant mechanical forces in an often ischaemic, inflamed, biochemically hostile environment may cause poor cell survival and retention. It is hypothesised that tissue engineering techniques could be used to modify the environment to improve the efficacy of cell therapy. Similarly, it has been suggested Read More

Cardiac tissue is composed of muscle and non-muscle cells, surrounded by extracellular matrix (ECM) and spatially organized into a complex three-dimensional (3D) architecture to allow for coordinated contraction and electrical pulse propagation. Despite emerging evidence for cardiomyocyte turnover in mammalian hearts, the regenerative capacity of human cardiac tissue is insufficient to recover from damage, e.g. resulting Read More