Open AccessIsolated neonatal rat papillary muscles: a new model to translate neonatal rat myocyte signaling into contractile mechanics
Author(s) -
Nizamutdinov Damir,
Feng Hao,
Gerilechaogetu Fnu,
Dostal Joseph A.,
Foster Donald M.,
Glaser Shan S.,
Dostal David E.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
physiological reports
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.918
H-Index - 39
ISSN - 2051-817X
DOI - 10.14814/phy2.12694
Subject(s) - myocyte , cardiac myocyte , papillary muscle , contraction (grammar) , in vivo , cardiac function curve , medicine , cardiology , neuroscience , pathology , biology , heart failure , microbiology and biotechnology
Isolated cardiac tissue allows investigators to study mechanisms underlying normal and pathological conditions, which would otherwise be difficult or impossible to perform in vivo. Cultured neonatal rat ventricular cardiac myocytes ( NRVM ) are widely used to study signaling and growth mechanisms in the heart, primarily due to the versatility, economy, and convenience of this in vitro model. However, the lack of a well‐defined longitudinal cellular axis greatly hampers the ability to measure contractile function in these cells, and therefore to associate signaling with mechanical function. In these methods, we demonstrate that this limitation can be overcome by using papillary muscles isolated from neonatal rat hearts. In the methods we describe procedures for isolation of right ventricular papillary muscles from 3‐day‐old neonatal rats and effects of mechanical and humoral stimuli on contraction and relaxation properties of these tissues.