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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2013 Apr 29.
Published in final edited form as: N Engl J Med. 2011 Jan 13;364(2):177–178. doi: 10.1056/NEJMcibr1013069

Figure 1. The Path from Fibroblast to Cardiomyocyte.

Figure 1

Ieda and colleagues1 recently showed that the expression of specific transcription factors in the mouse fibroblast can instigate the cell's transdifferentiation into a cardiomyocyte, as evidenced by the expression of green fluorescent protein (GFP), which has been engineered in such a way that it is turned on only in cardiomyocytes. Reprogrammed cells attained different tiers of cardiomyocyte identity — for example, 20% had cardiac reporter expression through a GFP transgene, 4% had cardiac expression of sarcomere genes (e.g., troponin T), and 1% showed spontaneous contractions and other functional properties of cardiomyocytes.