Stromal Cells in Dense Collagen Promote Cardiomyocyte and Microvascular Patterning in Engineered Human Heart Tissue.

ABSTRACT: Cardiac tissue engineering is a strategy to replace damaged contractile tissue and model cardiac diseases to discover therapies. Current cardiac and vascular engineering approaches independently create aligned contractile tissue or perfusable vasculature, but a combined vascularized cardiac tissue remains to be achieved. Here, we sought to incorporate a patterned microvasculature into engineered heart tissue, which balances the competing demands from cardiomyocytes to contract the matrix versus the vascular lumens that need structural support. Low-density collagen hydrogels (1.25 mg/mL) permit human embryonic stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes (hESC-CMs) to form a dense contractile tissue but cannot support a patterned microvasculature. Conversely, high collagen concentrations (density ≥6 mg

SUBMITTER: Roberts MA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4840925 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature