Epicardial progenitors contribute to the cardiomyocyte lineage in the developing heart

B Zhou, Q Ma, S Rajagopal, SM Wu, I Domian… - Nature, 2008 - nature.com
B Zhou, Q Ma, S Rajagopal, SM Wu, I Domian, J Rivera-Feliciano, D Jiang, A von Gise…
Nature, 2008nature.com
The heart is formed from cardiogenic progenitors expressing the transcription factors Nkx2-5
and Isl1 (refs and). These multipotent progenitors give rise to cardiomyocyte, smooth muscle
and endothelial cells, the major lineages of the mature heart,. Here we identify a novel
cardiogenic precursor marked by expression of the transcription factor Wt1 and located
within the epicardium—an epithelial sheet overlying the heart. During normal murine heart
development, a subset of these Wt1+ precursors differentiated into fully functional …
Abstract
The heart is formed from cardiogenic progenitors expressing the transcription factors Nkx2-5 and Isl1 (refs and ). These multipotent progenitors give rise to cardiomyocyte, smooth muscle and endothelial cells, the major lineages of the mature heart,. Here we identify a novel cardiogenic precursor marked by expression of the transcription factor Wt1 and located within the epicardium—an epithelial sheet overlying the heart. During normal murine heart development, a subset of these Wt1+ precursors differentiated into fully functional cardiomyocytes. Wt1+ proepicardial cells arose from progenitors that express Nkx2-5 and Isl1, suggesting that they share a developmental origin with multipotent Nkx2-5+ and Isl1+ progenitors. These results identify Wt1+ epicardial cells as previously unrecognized cardiomyocyte progenitors, and lay the foundation for future efforts to harness the cardiogenic potential of these progenitors for cardiac regeneration and repair.
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