Pulsatile Cardiac Tissue Grafts Using a Novel Three-Dimensional Cell Sheet Manipulation Technique Functionally Integrates With the Host Heart, In Vivo

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Abstract
We devised a method of fabricating easily transplantable scaffoldless 3D heart tissue, made with a novel cell-sheet (CS) technology from cultured cardiomyocytes using a fibrin polymer coated dish. In the present study, we tested in vivo electrical communication which is essential for improving heart function between the host heart and the grafted CS. The epicardial surface of the ventricle of an anesthetized open-chest nude rat was ablated by applying a heated metal. Bilayered CS was obtained from neonatal rat primary culture. CS was transplanted onto the injured myocardial surface (sMI) (sMI+sheet group). The rats were allowed to recover for 1 to 4 weeks, to stabilize the grafts. Action potentials (APs) from the excised perfused heart were monitored by the fluorescence signal of di-4ANEPPS with a high speed charge-coupled device camera. The APs were observed under epicardial pacing of the host heart or the CS grafts. The pacing threshold of the current output was measured in the sMI+sheet group and in th...