New article published in Stem Cell Reports
Chang et al. published in Stem Cell Reports
"Increased tissue stiffness triggers contractile dysfunction and telomere shortening in dystrophic cardiomyocytes" was published on September 14, 2021 in Stem Cell Reports. The paper, a collaborative effort between the lab members of the John Day, Beth Pruitt, Joseph C. Wu, and Helen M. Blau labs, explores the role of tissue stiffness and telomere length in cardiomyocytes of Duchenne muscular dystrophy patients. Using induced pluripotent stem cells that they differentiated to cardiomyocytes (iPSC-CMs), the authors showed that DMD hiPSC-CMs exhibit aberrant calcium handling and defective force generation and undergo proliferation-independent telomere shortening, and that telomere shortening is contraction dependent and activates the p53 pathway.