Human umbilical vein endothelial cells fuse with cardiomyocytes but do not activate cardiac gene expression

Transplantation of undifferentiated murine embryonic stem cells in the heart: teratoma formation and immune response

“…Animals were euthanized with an overdose of pentobarbital (Delmarva Laboratories, Inc., Midlothian, VA, USA) at 3 wk postinjection unless specified otherwise. The hearts were collected and fixed in methyl Carnoy's solution for 24 h, and routinely processed, paraffin‐embedded and sectioned for histological evaluation (37, 38).…”

“…To determine if fusion occurs in hearts grafted with ES cells, undifferentiated C57Bl/6 ES cells were transfected with Ad‐floxed‐LacZ adenovirus (˜250 particles/cell; Microbix Bio‐systems, Toronto, ONT, Canada) as described (37, 38). 500,000 cells were prepared and injected into the uninjured heart of an α‐MHC/Cre FVB/N mouse in which Cre recom‐binase is expressed only in cardiomyocytes (37) ( n =3).…”

Epiblast Embryo Stem Cells Give Origin to Adult Pluripotent Cell Populations: Primordial Germ Cell, Pericytic and Haematopoyetic Stem Cells. A Review

“…This suggests the endothelium as a source of HSC; however, it has not yet been clearly demonstrated that this cell type can develop other types of cells such as cardiomyocytes. More over endothelium functions in tissue regeneration remains unclear (Welikson et al, 2006). Nevertheless, it has been shown that VE-cadherin+ cells from the vascular endothelium isolated from embryos and the cord can develop into haematopoietic cells (Hirai et al).…”

“…This may be because endothelial cell lines differentiate after several passes, reducing their pluripotentiality. Even so, it has not been demonstrated that endothelial cells are transdifferentiated in cardiomyocytes (Welikson et al, 2006). Transplantion of pericytic HuCPVCs into a MI model indicates that these cells can recover cardiac function, representing a substantial source of cells for allogeneic cell therapy from donor to patient (Sarugaser et al;Wu et al, 2007).…”

Transdifferentiation and its applicability for inner ear therapy

“…Attempts to induce transdifferentiation of human endothelial progenitor cells into cardiomyocytes have also failed (Gruh et al, 2006). Another approach to transdifferentiate human umbilical vein endothelial cells to cardiomyocytes in vitro did not reveal cardiac gene expression in these cells either (Welikson et al, 2006). It is not clear why some attempts to induce transdifferentiation succeed and others fail.…”