New technique devised for turning skin cells into heart cells

Scientists in Israel have achieved a regenerative medicine breakthrough by devising a means of converting skin tissue into functioning heart muscle cells.

A team at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology and Rambam Medical Center in Haifa have found a way of using human-induced pluripotent stem cells to produce healthy new heart muscle cells that are capable of integrating with existing heart tissue.

This opens up many potential healthcare applications, as it would make it possible to take skin samples from an elderly heart failure patient and create new heart cells comparable to those they had at birth.

Further obstacles remain on the path to clinical translation, such as the need to scale the technique up to derive a clinically relevant number of cells, developing safe transplantation strategies and procedures, and securing necessary funding.

Professor Lior Gepstein, who led the research, said: "I assume it will take at least five to ten years to clinical trials if one can overcome these problems."

The discovery has been welcomed by the British Heart Foundation as a positive development for the 750,000 people in the UK living with heart failure.