3D Printing of Functional Heart Chambers and Vascularized Whole Hearts
2The Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, Tel Aviv University, Israel
3The Department of Biomedical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Tel Aviv University, Israel
4Sagol Center for Regenerative Biotechnology, Tel Aviv University, Israel
Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are the number one cause of death in the US. To date, heart transplantation is the only treatment for patients with end-stage heart failure. Since the number of cardiac donors is limited, alternative approaches are needed. Among them is the emerging concept of tissue engineering, with three-dimensional (3D) bio-printing being an important tool to engineer functional tissues. Printing of a whole heart has been demonstrated, but so far, the printed hearts were mainly composed of a mixed population of cardiac cells and emphasis was not given to introduction of different cardiomyocytes sub-types, mainly ventricular and atrial myocytes, in their correct anatomic location. This project is focused on 3D bio-printing of functional heart chambers and whole hearts with major blood vessels. To this end, we differentiated induced pluripotent stem cells (IPSCs) to ventricular and atrial cardiomyocytes (CMs) and used extrusion-based printing to fabricate the volumetric structures. The printed constructs then underwent in vitro maturation in specialized bioreactor or matured in vivo by transplantation into rats. Finally, the printed structures were assessed for their morphology and functionality.