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Nature Medicine 9, 1109 - 1110 (2003)
doi:10.1038/nm0903-1109

Akt helps stem cells heal the heart

Omer N Koç1 & Stanton L Gerson1

  1. Omer N. Koç and Stanton L. Gerson are in the Division of Hematology/Oncology, Center for Stem Cell and Regenerative Medicine and Comprehensive Cancer Center, Case Western Reserve University and University Hospitals of Cleveland, 10900 Euclid Ave, Cleveland, Ohio 44106, USA. e-mail: onk2@cwru.edu or e-mail: slg5@cwru.edu

Bone marrow–derived stem cells have been used with some success in animal models to repair ischemic damage to the heart. Overexpression of the survival-promoting signal Akt greatly enhances the ability of these cells to heal a heart after myocardial infarction (pages 1195–1201).

Of the millions of people who suffer heart attacks each year, most experience irreversible myocardial damage due to lack of oxygen. Short of heart transplantation, current treatments improve the quality and duration of life but they do not restore cardiac function, nor do they increase the number of functional myocardial cells.