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Hypertrophy, gene expression, and beating of neonatal cardiac myocytes are affected by microdomain heterogeneity in 3D

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Abstract

Cardiac myocytes are known to be influenced by the rigidity and topography of their physical microenvironment. It was hypothesized that 3D heterogeneity introduced by purely physical microdomains regulates cardiac myocyte size and contraction. This was tested in vitro using polymeric microstructures (G′ = 1.66 GPa) suspended with random orientation in 3D by a soft Matrigel matrix (G′ = 22.9 Pa). After 10 days of culture, the presence of 100 μm-long microstructures in 3D gels induced fold increases in neonatal rat ventricular myocyte size (1.61 ± 0.06, p < 0.01) and total protein/cell ratios (1.43 ± 0.08, p < 0.05) that were comparable to those induced chemically by 50 μM phenylephrine treatment. Upon attachment to microstructures, individual myocytes also had larger cross-sectional areas (1.57 ± 0.05, p < 0.01) and higher average rates of spontaneous contraction (2.01 ± 0.08, p < 0.01) than unattached myocytes. Furthermore, the inclusion of microstructures in myocyte-seeded gels caused significant increases in the expression of beta-1 adrenergic receptor (β1-AR, 1.19 ± 0.01), cardiac ankyrin repeat protein (CARP, 1.26 ± 0.02), and sarcoplasmic reticulum calcium-ATPase (SERCA2, 1.59 ± 0.12, p < 0.05), genes implicated in hypertrophy and contractile activity. Together, the results demonstrate that cardiac myocyte behavior can be controlled through local 3D microdomains alone. This approach of defining physical cues as independent features may help to advance the elemental design considerations for scaffolds in cardiac tissue engineering and therapeutic microdevices.

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Abbreviations

3D:

three dimensions

AraC:

cytosine β-D-arabino-furanoside

β1-AR:

beta-1 adrenergic receptor

β2M:

beta-2 microglobulin

BDM:

2,3-butanedione monoxime

BPM:

beats per minute

BSA:

bovine serum albumin

CARP:

cardiac ankyrin repeat protein

COX8H:

cytochrome c oxidase subunit VIII heart/muscle

DAPI:

4′,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole

DIC:

differential interference contrast

DMEM:

Dulbecco’s modified Eagle’s medium

DOB:

dobutamine

ECM:

extracellular matrix

PBS:

phosphate buffered saline

PE:

phenylephrine

PEGDMA:

poly(ethylene glycol) dimethacrylate

SDS:

sodium dodecyl sulfate

SEM:

standard error of measurement

SERCA2:

sarcoplasmic reticulum calcium-ATPase

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Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Perla Ayala at the University of California at San Francisco for her ongoing help in fabricating microstructures. This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health grants T32 HL007692, PO1 HL62426, and RO1 HL090523.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Bioengineering, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA

    Matthew W. Curtis

  2. Department of Physiology and Biophysics (MC 901), University of Illinois at Chicago, 835 S. Wolcott Avenue, Chicago, IL, 60612-7342, USA

    Sadhana Sharma & Brenda Russell

  3. Department of Physiology and Division of Bioengineering, University of California at San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA

    Tejal A. Desai

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  1. Matthew W. Curtis
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Correspondence to Brenda Russell.

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Curtis, M.W., Sharma, S., Desai, T.A. et al. Hypertrophy, gene expression, and beating of neonatal cardiac myocytes are affected by microdomain heterogeneity in 3D. Biomed Microdevices 12, 1073–1085 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10544-010-9461-y

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