Scientists have for the first time documented all of the different cell types and genes expressed in the healthy human heart, in research published today in the journal Nature.
Cardiologists from the Mazankowski Alberta Heart Institute at the University of Alberta joined teams from Cambridge, Boston and Berlin to use state-of-the-art analytical techniques to sequence the ribonucleic acids (RNA) in nine types of single cells from six regions of the heart.
“Now we have a single-cell atlas of the normal human heart, including cellular composition and gene expression,” said Gavin Oudit, professor in the Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry, Canada Research Chair in Heart Failure, and director of the Mazankowski’s Heart Function Clinic and its Human Explanted Heart Program.
Oudit said this is the first step toward understanding heart disease and developing new targeted treatments to stop it.
Continue reading at University of Alberta.
Image via Ryan O'Byrne.