Speaker: Juan Manuel Gonzalez-Rosa, assistant professor of medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School

Title: "Identifying critical barriers to heart regeneration using zebrafish"

Abstract: The adult human heart cannot regenerate after injury. As a result, myocardial infarctions and other cardiac diseases that result in cardiomyocyte death lead to permanent fibrotic scarring and heart failure. Although this regenerative incompetence characterizes the heart of all adult mammals, it is not the case for all animals. The zebrafish, a classical developmental biology model, shows a remarkable ability to regenerate after cardiac injury. Since the original discovery of this phenomenon in 2002, dozens of laboratories worldwide have used zebrafish to dissect the role of several signaling pathways in heart regeneration. Here, we will discuss the role of three factors classically linked to the inability to regenerate. First, we will focus on cardiac fibrosis, long believed to block regeneration in mammals. Then, we will analyze the impact of cardiomyocyte polyploidization (i.e., the increase in DNA content) on regenerative competence. Finally, we will discuss the effects of inflammation during zebrafish cardiac regeneration. In the long-run, fundamental discoveries from a natural regeneration model will inform the development of therapeutic strategies to regenerate the injured human heart.

Host: Clyde Campbell, adjunct assistant professor in the Department of Genetics, Development and Cell Biology

Zoom link: https://iastate.zoom.us/j/96721371581?pwd=QzM3M0cycjFzYXNRdVJVYkE0MVg1QT09