Evolution of the c-kit-Positive Cell Response to Pathological Challenge in the Myocardium

Abstract

STEM CELLS 2008;26:1315-1324 Disclosure of potential conflicts of interest is found at the end of this article.

c-kit expression identifies cardiovascular precursors in the neonatal heart

“…Bernex et al (22) and Wouters et al (23) knocked reporters into the c-kit locus, but did not examine cardiac expression, and the dominant nature of the c-kit locus complicates this strategy. A minimal c-kit promoter strategy yielded similar results with the concordance of CD117 and anti-GFP staining that declined after birth (24,25). We show that embryonic and postnatal c-kit ϩ cells are in a mixed developmental state within the developing heart (Fig.…”

Inhibition of Histone Deacetylase-induced Myocardial Repair Is Mediated by c-kit in Infarcted Hearts

“…The c-kit ϩ CSCs have been identified to reconstitute well differentiated myocardium in infarcted hearts (20,29). Inhibition of HDAC promoted a dramatic increase in c-kit ϩ CSCs in the Kit ϩ/ϩ MI mice but a decrease in Kit W /Kit W-v mice, suggesting that the reduction of c-kit ϩ CSCs is directly associated with an impairment of cardiac repair and myocardial function recovery by disruption of c-kit signaling.…”

Nuclear Calcium/Calmodulin-dependent Protein Kinase II Signaling Enhances Cardiac Progenitor Cell Survival and Cardiac Lineage Commitment

“…***, p Ͻ 0.0001 Sham versus 7 Day MI. and hypertrophic growth (33). To determine if endogenous c-kit ϩ CPCs express CaMKII␦ isoforms in vivo, CPCs were colabeled with a pan CaMKII␦ antibody.…”