Myocardial Infarction in the Mouse

Dr. Wang in the laboratory has developed an in vivo open chest model of myocardial infarction(MI) in the mouse that closely mimics the human syndrome of acute MI. Briefly, the chest is opened through a thoracotomy and a major branch of the left anterior descending coronary artery (LAD) is occluded for 30 minutes. The occlusion is then removed, the chest closed, and the vasculature and heart allowed to reperfuse for 24 hours. The animal is then sacrificed and the heart is excised and perfused with triphenyltetrazolium chloride (TTC) to facilitate determination of the live (appears red) verses dead (appears white) myocardial tissue. The LAD is then reoccluded in the same place as before and the heart perfused with phthalo blue dye. This process leaves regions of the myocardium not rendered ischemic by the occlusion stained blue. In this regard, infarct size is characterized as a percentage of the region that was ischemic (region at risk) during occlusion. We use this model on a regular basis to examine the role of known or suspected cardiac protective proteins in the development or prevention of MI.

Cultured Neonatal Mouse Cardiomyocytes

We commonly employ a model of isolated adult mouse and rabbit cardiomyocytes. These cells are analyzed using a battery of biochemical and molecular biological approaches, notably adenoviral-mediated gene transfer.

Cultured Neonatal Mouse Cardiomyocytes

Also developed by Dr. Wang, while working for Dr. Y. James Kang at the University of Louisville, is a model of cultured neonatal mouse cardiomyocytes (this was the first such model in the world). Briefly, one to three day old mice are euthanized, the hearts excised and the ventricles retained for cell isolation. Ventricles are washed, minced into small fragments and the cells enzymatically separated. Non-muscle and muscle cells are then separated and muscle cells plated in tissue culture dishes for experimentation. These cells are analyzed using various biochemical and molecular biological assays.