Conversion of human fibroblasts into functional cardiomyocytes by small molecules

• DOI: 10.1126/science.aaf1502
• Publication Date: 2016-04-29T06:13:07Z
• Authors: Nan Cao; Yu Huang; Jiashun Zheng; C. Ian Spencer; Yu Zhang; Ji-Dong Fu; Baoming Nie; Min Xie; Mingliang Zhang; Haixia Wang; Tianhua Ma; Tao Xu; Guilai Shi; Deepak Srivastava; Sheng Ding
• Keywords: Male; Myosin Heavy Chains; Protein Conformation; Organogenesis; Myocardial Infarction; Heart; Fibroblasts; Cellular Reprogramming; Chromatin; Small Molecule Libraries; Disease Models, Animal; Mice; Mice, Inbred NOD; Cell Transdifferentiation; Animals; Humans; Cell Lineage; Cellular Reprogramming Techniques; Myocytes, Cardiac; Skin

Making cardiac cells from fibroblasts

Reprogramming noncardiac cells into functional cardiomyocytes without any genetic manipulation could open up new avenues for cardiac regenerative therapies. Cao et al. identified a combination of nine small molecules that could epigenetically activate human fibroblasts, efficiently reprogramming them into chemically induced cardiomyocytes (ciCMs). The ciCMs contracted uniformly and resembled human cardiomyocytes. This method may be adapted for reprogramming multiple cell types and have important implications in regenerative medicine.

Science , this issue p. 1216