Tamoxifen study published in Nature Regenerative Medicine
Figure 3 from the Nature Regenerative Medicine study
"Tamoxifen treatment ameliorates contractile dysfunction of Duchenne muscular dystrophy stem cell-derived cardiomyocytes on bioengineered substrates" was recently published in Nature Regenerative Medicine by the Blau lab. Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is a progressive genetic myopathy that leads to heart failure from dilated cardiomyopathy by early adulthood. In this publication lead authors Foster Birnbaum and Asuka Eguchi applied a unique bioengineered human-induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiomyocyte (iPSC-CM) platform to shed light on how tamoxifen, a selective estrogen receptor modulator widely used to treat breast cancer, could be applied to treat DMD cardiomyopathy. Their data show that 4-hydroxytamoxifen treatment of DMD iPSC-CMs decreased beating rate, increased beating velocity, and ameliorated calcium-handling deficits, leading to prolonged viability. This work was also featured in a CVI article by Adrienne Mueller, PhD!