Discussion

This presentation will cover the application of phenotypic screening using high content imaging for regenerative medicine approaches to endogenous repair of the heart tissue following myocardial infarction.

Myocardial Infarction leads to irreversible damage of the heart muscle often resulting in heart failure, arrhythmias and death. Given the limited capacity for the adult human heart to regenerate following injury, a key area of research is to enhance repair through expansion and stimulation of resident progenitor cell populations. A suite of multi-parametric, phenotypic assays have been developed to identify small molecule compounds that promote the proliferation of cardiac progenitor cells & their differentiation into cardiomyocytes. These assays have been utilised to screen phenotypic compound sets aimed to identify small molecules that promote proliferation.

Any new targets identified hold the potential to offer promising new therapeutic strategies for the treatment of heart failure.