Nature: For the first time, human heart cell and molecular maps will be personalized for heart disease treatment.

In a new study, researchers from Harvard Medical School, Bregan Women's Hospital, the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in the United Kingdom, Imperial College London and the Max del Bruck Center for Molecular Medicine in Germany built detailed cell and molecular maps of healthy human hearts to understand how this important organ functions and shed light on cardiovascular disease.
results were published online September 24, 2020 in the journal Nature, under the title "Cells of the adult human heart".
photo from Frontiers in Cardiovascular Medicine, 2018, doi:10.3389/fcvm.2018.00101.
the authors analyzed nearly half a million cells to create the most comprehensive map of human heart cells to date.
map shows the huge diversity of cells and reveals myocardial cell types, heart-protective immune cells, and complex vascular networks.
also predicts how these cells communicate to keep the heart working properly.
study is part of the Human Cell Atlas program, which aims to map every cell type in the body.
new molecular and cellular knowledge of the heart promises to give people a better understanding of heart disease and to guide the development of highly personalized treatments.
the study also laid the groundwork for future development of treatments based on regenerative medicine, the authors said.
in a person's lifetime, the heart emits an average of more than 2 billion life-sustaining beatings to the body.
in doing so, it helps deliver oxygen and nutrients to cells, tissues and organs, and removes carbon dioxide and waste.
, the heart beats about 100,000 times a day in four different chambers, and its beat rate changes with rest, movement and stress.
beat requires cells in different parts of the heart to maintain extremely complex and perfect synchronization.
when this complex coordination occurs, cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide, with an estimated 17.9 million deaths each year.
to learn more about the molecular processes in healthy heart cells is critical to understanding what goes wrong in heart disease.
knowledge can lead to more accurate and better treatment strategies for all forms of cardiovascular disease.
millions of people are being treated for cardiovascular disease," said Christine Seidman, a co-author of the paper and a professor of medicine at the Blavatnik Institute at Harvard Medical School.
understanding the healthy heart will help us understand the interaction between cell types and cell states, and the differences between these cells in disease.
," Seidman said, "Ultimately, these basic insights may suggest specific targets for personalized treatment in the future, creating personalized heart disease drugs, and improving the effectiveness of treatment for each patient."
the authors studied nearly half a million cells and nuclei in six different regions of the heart from 14 heart healthy but unsuitable transplanted organ donors.
using a combined single-cell analysis, machine learning, and imaging techniques, they were able to observe which genes were turned on and off in each cell.
the authors found significant differences in cells in different regions of the heart.
also observed that each region of the heart has a specific subset of cells --- a finding that points to different developmental origins and suggests that these cells may react differently to treatment.
"This project marks the beginning of a new understanding of how the heart is constructed from single cells, many of which have different cell states," said Daniel Reichart, a genetic researcher at Harvard Medical School and co-lead author of the paper.
as we learn about regional differences across the heart, we can begin to consider the effects of age, exercise, and disease, and help drive the field of cardiology into the era of precision medicine. "This is the first time that a single cell of the human heart has been observed at this scale, and this is only possible under large-scale single-cell sequencing," said Co-author of the
paper, Norbert Hübner of the Max del Bruck Center for Molecular Medicine.
study shows the power of single-cell genomics and international cooperation.
understanding all heart cells and their genetic activity is essential to understanding heart function and beginning to reveal how it responds to stress and disease.
study, the authors also looked at blood vessels through the heart in unprecedented detail.
the map shows how cells in these veins and arteries adapt to different pressures and locations, and how this helps people understand what is wrong with blood vessels during coronary heart disease. "Our international cooperation sheds light on the molecular and cell details of the heart cells that pump blood throughout the body, providing the scientific community with a valuable set of information," said
co-author Michelle Noseda of Imperial College London and co-author of the paper.
we mapped heart cells that could be infected with SARS-CoV-2 and found that specific cells in small blood vessels were also targeted for the virus infection.
data set is a treasure trove of information on the nuances of heart disease.
authors also focus on understanding heart repair, studying how immune cells in healthy hearts interact and communicate with other cells, and how they are different from skeletal muscles.
further research will include exploring whether any heart cells can be induced to repair themselves.
Sah Teichmann of the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, co-author of the paper, said, "This great collaboration is part of the Global Human Cell Mapping Program, which aims to build a 'Google Maps' of the human body.
"The heart cell map is open to scientists around the world, and it's a fantastic resource that will lead to new understandings of heart health and disease, the development of new treatments, and perhaps even ways to regenerate damaged heart tissue," she said.
" Reference: 1. Monika Litviňuková et al. Cells of the adult human heart. Nature, 2020, doi:10.1038/s41586-020-2797-4.2.Highly detailed map of the human heart can guide aeded hearts This article was originally published from Bio Valley, for more information please download Bio Valley APP (