2021 - Transient Cell Cycle Induction in Cardiomyocytes to Treat Ischemic Heart Failure
CardioExcyte 96 prepublication in Research Square (2021)
Authors:
Abouleisa R., Ou Q., Tang X-L., Solanki M., Guo Y., Nong Y., Mcnally L., Lorkiewicz P., Kassem K., Ahern B., Choudhary K., Thomas R., Huang Y., Juhardeen H., Siddique A., Ifthikar Z., Salama A-B., Hammad S., Elbaz A., Ivey K., Satin J., Hill B., Srivastava D., Bolli R., Mohamed T.
Journal:
Research Square (2021) doi: 10.21203/rs.3.rs-122026/v1
Abstract:
The regenerative capacity of the heart after myocardial infarction (MI) is limited. Our previous study showed that ectopic introduction of Cdk1/CyclinB1 and Cdk4/CyclinD1 complexes (4F) promotes cardiomyocyte proliferation in 15-20% of infected cardiomyocytes in vitro and in vivo and improves cardiac function after MI. Here, we aim to identify the necessary reprogramming stages during the forced cardiomyocyte proliferation with 4F on a single cell basis. Also, we aim to start the first preclinical testing to introduce 4F gene therapy as a candidate for the treatment of ischemia-induced heart failure. Temporal bulk and single-cell RNAseq and further biochemical validations of mature hiPS-CMs treated with either LacZ or 4F adenoviruses revealed full cell cycle reprogramming in 15% of the cardiomyocyte population after 48 h post-infection with 4F, which was associated with sarcomere disassembly and metabolic reprogramming. Transient overexpression of 4F, specifically in cardiomyocytes, was achieved using a polycistronic non-integrating lentivirus (NIL) encoding the 4F; each is driven by a TNNT2 promoter (TNNT2-4F-NIL). TNNT2-4F-NIL or control virus was injected intramyocardially one week after MI in rats or pigs. TNNT2-4F-NIL treated animals showed significant improvement in left ventricular ejection fraction and scar size compared with the control virus treated animals four weeks post-injection.
In conclusion, the present study provides a mechanistic demonstration of the process of forced cardiomyocyte proliferation and advances the clinical feasibility of this approach by minimizing the oncogenic potential of the cell cycle factors using a novel transient and cardiomyocyte-specific viral construct.
