Will make the heart heal damaged areas after a heart attack

The ribbed newt is an amphibian that can heal its own damaged heart tissue. Wallenberg Academy Fellow Elif Eroglu is studying these animals to understand how this occurs. The aim is to be able to manipulate cells in the human heart so that they can repair the damage caused by a heart attack. 

During a heart attack, millions of heart muscle cells are deprived of oxygen and die; in the human heart, this leads to irreversible damage. The muscle cells are replaced by other cells, fibroblasts, which form a scar that weakens the heart muscle. 

However, some animals can repair their hearts. Dr Elif Eroglu from Karolinska Institutet is studying one of these: the ribbed newt. She has discovered that cells surrounding the heart, epicardial cells, move to the damaged area. They then utilize a specific protein, claudin 6, to attach to each other, forming a honeycomb-like pattern during the healing process. This seems to be important, because when the researchers switch off this ability regeneration stops. 

Eroglu will now investigate why the hexagonal pattern is necessary and whether the newt’s cells also form fibroblasts instead of muscle without it. Using a heart organoid – a three-dimensional self-organized structure of heart cells grown by researchers – she will also try to make human epicardial cells form the hexagonal pattern. The long-term goal is to find strategies for healing the human heart following a heart attack.  

Photo Patrik Lundin