Innate Immune Response in Cardiac Healing and Rejuvenation

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Abstract Myocardial infarction (MI) due to underlying atherosclerosis is the leading disease sequela that precipitates heart failure in the Western world. Our ability to treat these patients and their heart failure has not progressed beyond a mild 20-30% extension in life span realized some 3 decades ago with neuroendocrine-based management. New therapeutic avenues are needed, the most dramatic of which would be directly generating new cardiomyocyte to regenerate the damaged area of heart tissue. Previous attempts to regenerate the heart through new myocyte production have not been successful despite more than 15 years of research using adult progenitor cells. However, studies with cardiac progenitor cells in rodent models did show a functional benefit to the MI-injured heart, and we and others have identified a novel mechanism of benefit whereby injected progenitor cells had a rejuvenating effect through refinement of the immune response. Indeed, we have shown that cell therapy injections can optimize healing, reduce infarct area expansion and augment scar borderzone physical properties (Vagnozzi et al., 2020, Nature). These beneficial effects were mediated through selective macrophage subtype activity in the heart, underscoring the importance of the immune response in infarct healing and compensation. Here we propose the hypothesis that selective innate immune response signaling pathways, and macrophage subtype polarization can be exploited to further heal MI injury. Our more specific hypothesis is that MI injury or cell therapy has an underlying protective component through cGAS- Sting in both cardiomyocytes and macrophages, and this can be therapeutically exploited to polarize the immune response for better healing. The specific aims are: AIM #1, To use mouse genetics to identify the specific immune cell-types in the heart that mediate cell therapy-based cardiac rejuvenation post-MI injury. AIM #2, To examine the mechanism of innate immune signaling in the heart through cGAS-Sting. AIM #3, To investigate the mechanisms whereby cell therapy rejuvenates the post-MI injured heart. Such studies will be critical for examining how innate immune signaling at the level of macrophages impacts the heart during an inflammatory injury response or due to cell therapy with the goal of modifying this response to benefit healing in patients.