Researchers at U of T’s Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering (IBBME) and the McEwen Centre for Regenerative Medicine have created the first-ever living three-dimensional human arrhythmia model, with hopes of revolutionizing the field of cardiac disease research.
The product of the team’s original discovery is an understanding of the composition of the cell population of the heart, and the corresponding ratios of the cells. Using pluripotent stem cells and mixing differentiated cells together, Nimalan Thavandiran, a first author and fourth-year IBBME phd student, demonstrated that approximately 25 per cent of the heart cells are cardiac fibroblasts, while 75 per cent are cardiomyocytes.
From there, the team went on to grow the cells on three-dimensional “wires,” yielding live tissue samples, and it wasn’t long before they managed to produce a revolutionary three-dimensional arrhythmia tissue model. Professor Peter Zandstra, co-author and supervisor of the research, is eager for the uses of these miniaturized heart tissue samples in testing the effects of drug therapy on cardiac diseases.
Apart from pharmaceutical testing, the science behind this research could even lead to the discovery of novel therapeutic methods for treating various cardiac diseases.
