A repair "kit" for the infarcted heart

John L Mignone1, Charles E Murry

  • 1Department of Medicine/Cardiology, Institute for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98109, USA.

Cell Stem Cell
|April 9, 2011
PubMed

Transplanted, c-kit expressing marrow-derived progenitors can enhance the function of an infarcted heart, but the mechanism remains unclear. In this issue of Cell Stem Cell, Loffredo et al. (2011) provide evidence that hematopoietic precursors do not differentiate into new cardiomyocytes but, rather, stimulate production of new cardiomyocytes from endogenous progenitors.