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Electrical stimulation induces differentiation of human cardiosphere-derived cells (hCDCs) to committed cardiomyocyte

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Abstract

Logistic complexities of heart transplantation embossed the necessity of utilizing novel methods, which enable heart regeneration. Human cardiosphere-derived cells (hCDCs) are taken into consideration as a promising cell resource in cell therapy in recent years. In this study, we designed an electrochemical stimulation system, which sends square pulses to the hCDCs and records their electrical response. Morphology, viability and differentiation of hCDCs are monitored at certain time courses of the treatment. Differentiating hCDCs aligned perpendicularly with respect to the direction of applied electric current, and obtained a spindle-like morphology, while they remained viable. At the same time, specific cardiac marker genes including GATA4, cTnT and α-MHC showed a considerable up-regulation. Our findings confirm that hCDCs differentiate to committed cardiomyocytes when hCDCs receive an electrical energy of 0.06 – 0.12 Wh. This amount of electrical energy could be applied to the stem cells using versatile electrical stimulation patterns via commercially available devices.

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Acknowledgements

We wish to thank Iran University of Medical Sciences for the use of their laboratory facilities.

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Author notes

  1. Hojjatollah Nazari and Mousa Kehtari have contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cellular and Molecular Research Center, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Hojjatollah Nazari & Mohammad Taghi Joghataei

  2. Department of Medical Nanotechnology, School of Advanced Technologies in Medicine, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Hojjatollah Nazari & Behnaz Ashtari

  3. Department of Stem Cell Biology, Stem Cell Technology Research Centre, Tehran, Iran

    Mousa Kehtari & Iman Rad

  4. Radiation Biology Center, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran

    Behnaz Ashtari

  5. Shahdad Ronak Commercialization Company, Pasdaran Street, Tehran, Iran

    Behnaz Ashtari

Authors
  1. Hojjatollah Nazari
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  2. Mousa Kehtari
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  5. Mohammad Taghi Joghataei
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Contributions

H.N., I.R. and B.A. conceived this study. H.N. and M.K. performed and analyzed biological experiments and wrote the first draft of manuscript. I.R. performed electrical conductivity experiments and also contributed to the writing of the manuscript. B.A. and MT.J. provided the financial support, designed and analyzed the experiments and discussed the results and approved the manuscript. All authors approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Iman Rad or Behnaz Ashtari.

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Nazari, H., Kehtari, M., Rad, I. et al. Electrical stimulation induces differentiation of human cardiosphere-derived cells (hCDCs) to committed cardiomyocyte. Mol Cell Biochem 470, 29–39 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11010-020-03742-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11010-020-03742-6

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